Vivendi petition

[archer]

Hello Mantera,

We have been thinking at The Hell mod's forums about contacting Vivendi with the following letter. What do you think about it?

I know only one address for them: [e-mail]
Do you know by chance another or a better one (this seems to be for french language)?

Dear Vivendi!

I would like to petition you concerning your past games Diablo Hellfire and Lords of Magic SE. Now that you own both Blizzard and Sierra Entertainment you have all the rights over these great old games and their worlds. Both games mentioned above have a still flourishing fan base and modding community behind them. We would like to ask you about the following things:

1). These games are well aged and declaring them abandonware would create a truly grateful group of people and spark interest in upcoming sequels. This would increase the availability of these titles as they are difficult to locate for commercial purchase. Even officially releasing the game ISO files like EA did with Command & Conquer would be awesome for the fans.

2.) Consider the possibility of making these games available for digital download from your online store as did Blizzard with the original Diablo II and its expansion. We are absolutely sure that thousands of people would pay for legal downloads, especially considering the recent announcement of Diablo III. Anyone who legally downloaded Diablo II from Blizzard's store would surely like to download Diablo and the Hellfire expansion as well and our mods could provide still another reason to do so.

3). If either of the above options are considered, we would like to make a humble request from you. We would ask that you release the source code under a GPU general public license, to give us - the modding communities - the ability to keep these great games going. This way we could keep these otherwise very old games living and generating income: either by themselves, or by their sequels. We are sure that many people would return to these games out of nostalgia and with your help we could create an even more satisfying game world for them - at no cost or risk to you. Several other gaming companies also employ this move to keep the interest for their discontinued games going strong. The Doom and Quake series from Id Software are examples of this.

We are confident that both sides can only win in this process.

With all the best wishes and awaiting your answer:
Both games' modding community

www.thehell.narod.ru
mantera.xorgate.com

[Boaster]

Sounds good. I've been trying to contact Vivendi Tech support about getting the source code from them for Lords of Magic. They said they would email the proper department, but I never hear from them.

If you guys succeed, that'd be great.

[archer]

I have sent the letter with some minor changes (see above, I have updated the post) to the mentioned address. If no reply comes, maybe another person should try another e-mail address. If enough people asks them eventually we will surely catch their attention... :-)

[yuantiny]

Hmm ActivisionBlizzard is now a part of Vivendi. Think of Blizzard doing LoM2, holy moly. 8)

[Areille]

Sept 18, 2008 8:16:19 GMT -6 @yuantiny said:

Think of Blizzard doing LoM2, holy moly. 8)

ack that would be the end of LOM, they'd make it "WoWy" :/

[Boaster]

Feb 3, 2009 20:25:24 GMT -6 Areille said:

Sept 18, 2008 8:16:19 GMT -6 @yuantiny said:

Think of Blizzard doing LoM2, holy moly. 8)

ack that would be the end of LOM, they'd make it "WoWy" :/

Yes, they would.

[shin]

i don't think blizzard would make a bad job if they would ever do LOM 2. I have faith they would most likely do a great job in fact.

[Areille]

Feb 10, 2009 0:12:07 GMT -6 shin said:

i don't think blizzard would make a bad job if they would ever do LOM 2. I have faith they would most likely do a great job in fact.

Judging by the current direction of Blizzards art department I would absolutly hate to see what they would do to Lords of Magic, ever since Warcraft2 Blizzard's been moving further away from realism and more towards "happy land".
Just look at wow; the colours are cheesy and garish and the overuse of dark contour lines make it look realy cartoonish. It's not just warcraft that gets this treatment either, look at the screenshots for the new diablo instalment. Diablo used to be one of the darkest and grttiest games out there but the release of d3 screenshots sparked a wave of angry fans who even set up a petitioon with thousands of signatures demanding a rethink of the graphics.

And its not just the graphics that worry me, Blizzards insitence that every title must appeal to the masses to ensure success means they'd probabaly oversimply everything, they'd be no detailed storys in the library spellbook, everything would be in bold glowing icons and flashy-flashy, over the top spell effects.

Thats just my opinion anyway, I love some of blizzards games but wouldnt want them doing LOM2.

[tyr]

Lets not forget the one redeeming quality Blizzard has, however: they listen to their customers.

If they did LOM2 they'd probably hire designers who can deal with sharper designs anyway. They've probably heard anough about such feedbacks from Diablo 1 and Starcraft 1 fans, and LOM2 would be the perfect game for them to experiment with such designs and darker, more immersive storylines. If they did it would be a welcome addition to their list of games, for fans who've grown tired of their current,"usual" designs.

[Boaster]

Mar 13, 2009 12:53:53 GMT -6 tyr said:

Lets not forget the one redeeming quality Blizzard has, however: they listen to their customers.

If they did LOM2 they'd probably hire designers who can deal with sharper designs anyway. They've probably heard anough about such feedbacks from Diablo 1 and Starcraft 1 fans, and LOM2 would be the perfect game for them to experiment with such designs and darker, more immersive storylines. If they did it would be a welcome addition to their list of games, for fans who've grown tired of their current,"usual" designs.

Blizzard isn't what it used to be. Diablo 3 is going to be a live action cartoon video game basically. It's like they took Diablo 1, made it a cartoon! I think they should've taken a cue from Nintendo by NOT filling their library with unpopular things!


But again, I have grievances against Blizzard for their unfinished products!

[Venture Industries]

I'm under the impression all former Sierra Games will be marketed and distributed by Activision's division. Blizzard is way too committed to it's own character style and game series. Blizzard tends to do it's own thing since it has a great degree of autonomy in Vivendi. Activision sounds like a better choice than the WoW maker.

A new fantasy base MMO by Blizzard would compete too much with WoW and possibly split their user base. Blizzard is working on a new MMO. It's not disclosed yet but I would be overjoyed to the point of devotion to hear it's WoLOM, however I would be a little disappointed that it's not a turn-based RTS. The MMO is probably StarCraft based or sci-fi. Even a World of StarCraft would split their user base, but it would bring in more unique users as well.

With Sony releasing a new free MMO with great depth diverse game play. LOM would not be a bad choice as a counter move by Vivendi. LOM has so much potential in how the story and culture can develop. LOM also has so much developers can do with game play.

I really like the ideas on this forum about a next installment in the series. I see we all share many similar ideas.

[thandu]

Obsessive, perhaps. I have a big spreadsheet and a corresponding Text file in the works working to organize the basis for an MMO LoM. So far classes, stats, races and PvP relations work out.

It's fairly extensive.

[Boaster]

Mar 25, 2009 13:35:53 GMT -6 thandu said:

Obsessive, perhaps. I have a big spreadsheet and a corresponding Text file in the works working to organize the basis for an MMO LoM. So far classes, stats, races and PvP relations work out.

It's fairly extensive.

Look forward to seeing it. I hope you included all the races.

[Venture Industries]

Mar 25, 2009 13:35:53 GMT -6 thandu said:

Obsessive, perhaps. I have a big spreadsheet and a corresponding Text file in the works working to organize the basis for an MMO LoM. So far classes, stats, races and PvP relations work out.

It's fairly extensive.

That's not obsessive. That is definitely cool though! This game would make an awesome MMO.

[thandu]

I hope you included all the races.

I did, all humanoid races except for Mites and Rock Trolls are playable, plus a few new ones. Undead, draconic and demonic (except perhaps imps if you count them) There are also NO halfbreeds.

The setup is simple, you pick a faith and can choose one of that faith's races.

The setup is as such.

Order:
Archons
Minotaurs
Centaurs

Chaos:
Barbarians
Goblins
Ogres
Cyclopses

Water:
Amazons
Lizard Men
Lesser Water Giants

Fire:
Fire Giants
Lesser Fire Giants
Red Dwarves
Imps

Earth:
Gnomes
Rock Dwarves
Halflings
Stone Giants

Air:
Storm Giants
Faeries
Pixies
Witcar

Life:
Eldren
Dryads
Brownies

Death:
Golgothans
Orcs
Trolls


This leaves you with a crazy amount of choices.
Some races are new. Minotaurs are available because Minotaurs being added could fit well.

Witcars are interesting. Witcars will look a lot like the witch unit, a Green skinned human. Witcars have unstable body composition due to their confused genetics that mix Amazon, Goblin, Orc and Eldren. Somehow, this balances out, but if killed, their DNA causes them to melt.


Lesser Water Giants are also new, descended from the extinct water giants, they are shorter yet more agile that regular giants.

Lesser Fire Giants are in a similar boat, but you've seen them before in the form of Rockhurler units. They will indeed BLAZE across the battlefield.

There are 17 available classes, with each race having somewhere between 9 and 12 of them.

Classes have a bar or energy source that feeds their skills and abilities, and its more complex than just mana. Heck, not all magic classes even use mana.

Warfare: Warfare is for most of the warrior classes. It works simply (and perhaps unoriginally) enough. It starts empty, but as you hit or get hit, it fills up to its limit. This limit doesn't change, but quests may increase max capacity. Warfare will slowly empty back to 0 if you leave combat.

Piety: Used by holy or spiritual classes, Piety is like mana, but doesn't restore naturally very fast. Its also hard to increase its size. Piety however, can quickly be refilled if you can get some safety in the heat of battle. Piety is refilled by using a command called Prayer. The user will kneel and begin praying, restoring his Piety at a % rate, meaning you will need to pray for a set amount of time regardless of how high it is. If hit, you will take a critical strike and be immobilized temporarily though you keep all the piety you've gained.

Eluding: Crafty Thief Classes use this Roguish bar. Eluding Bar is always full, refills fast and has no way to increase in size. Eluding Bars tend to be used fast and then refill fast naturally. This means you can unleash heavy loads commonly enough, but you may need to wait for some skills are on large timers.

Mana: A simple stat, Intellect and Wisdom increase your mana, and Mana casts spells (though some physical skills are in there.) Mana regen is slow, and sitting increases its speed. Spells are often strong, to compensate for their somewhat limited ammo. Most mage classes have this, though not all.

Balance: Lastly, we have balance. Balance is balanced, and as such, it starts in the middle, and the size increases are effected by almost every stat, and the amount increase in always by some 2 divisibility. Balance users often have two varying skill types, or just have skills that reduce or refill it in different ways. It'll be important to mix and match your skills, because if you don't have enough in one direction, you need to use something that either fills or empties the bar. Balance naturally over a slow time will gravitate back towards the center.

These classes are.

Fighter: Basic warrior, good frontliner who can rally his allies, and can use defensive measures to score counterattacks and disarms. Uses Warfare.

Berserker: A less defensive warrior, Berserkers rip things apart and cause things to bleed or die fast, and are often resistant to effect magics. They are weak to assaults. Uses Warfare.

Paladin: A defensive warrior, Paladins are the warrior that cannot use dual wielding. That's okay, because he uses his Piety powers to inflict damage, take damage and even unleash some healing. Paladins aren't necessarily a bastion of justice, especially when you consider that there are Golgothan and Dwarven (both kinds) Paladins about. Uses Piety.

Templar: A fanatic, the first class that can switch between fighting styles, the Templar is a fanatic who can use brute force and magic, though not simultaneously. He can wear heavy arm, use defensive elemental magic and cause massive pain, but they tend to run out of steam in one style faster than more focused classes. Uses Warfare and Mana.

Ranger: The ranger is a hybrid, mixing the swiftness of a Thief with marksmanship and a bit of druidic magic, the Ranger can even take hits and dual wield. He doesn't excell too well in any one catergory, but in an adventuring team, his versatility can compensate in small parties. Rangers don't need nature to roam, they can have caves, swamps and even big cities and they can be evil. Uses Balance and Eluding.

Hunter: The master of physical ranged damage, Hunters can snipe with any ranged weapon they like, whether it be sling, bow, throwing stick or dart (or any other.) Hunters can have good affinity with wildlife, even unnatural wildlife if undead or lesser demonic creatures roam free. Their defenses are weak, but their skills at trapping can help hold foes at bay. Uses Balance.

Rogue: The dashing, the charming, Rogues can ensure you don't get stuck at locked doors, hidden traps, or unopened safes. They are more than just utility, because Rogues do it from behind. A rogue is a skilled backstabber with physical assault that can do well even at range. Rogues have decent survival and counterattack skills if taken from the front. Their stealthing ability makes them excellent scouts as well. Uses Eluding.

Assassin: If rogues do it from behind, then Assassins do it in JUST the right spot of your spinal cord that'll permanently blind you... WITH POISON! Assassins trade crafty thief skills (though they get venoms) for brutal assault skills. Their armor is weaker than a Rogue, for an Assassin must be a perfect stealth man, though he can unleash ranged assaults with poisoned arrows, knives and bolts as well. Assassins can cripple foes and kill them mercilessly, but can die just as fast themselves. Perhaps even sneakier scouts than the Rogue, an Assassin has a negativity about him. Uses: Eluding.

Bard: An almost ultimate hybrid, if he can't do it to some degree, you're probably seeking a heal. Bards master no trades besides music, and are crafty, magically apt, and are desired by parties far and wide, mostly for their music. Bards can be devious, so make sure you're not getting pickpocketted. Uses Eluding, Balance, Mana

Wizard: Don't be mislead, while yes, Wizards use mana magic, Wizards are not throwing fireballs. Wizards are using Arcane faith magic: Order, Death, Chaos and Life attack and effect magics. Wizards have some useful buffs and a smidgeon of lighter elemental attacks. In combat, their mind altering confusion and charm spells make larger fights that much easier. Uses Mana

Elementalist: The name says it all: Fire, Ice, Earth, Wind, Water and Lightning, an Elementalist enjoys the elements in all their forms. They can even summon elemental servants to protect them, useful because their defensive magics are more limited than a Wizard's. They possess decent elemental buffs, and a small amount of healing from almost all elements. Their best asset is their multi-elemental attack spells, which can be useful for safely getting past elemental resistances. Uses Mana

Sage: The sage is a sacred man, an unstable man, a Bard with no music or physical capacity. Mix Sorcery and sacred magic for a man (or woman) who has no boundries to their versatility. Granted, they need a buttload of stats, and their output in one category is lower than a purer spellcaster, but the sage has three bars to fall upon for great wise versatility. Uses Piety, Mana, and Balance

Priest: More of a cleric with his access to heavy armor, a Priest has reduced strength to ensure he doesn't try to tank often. Priests can heal and smite and use all blunt weapons. Priests are second to none at direct healing with the powers of water, fire, life and Chaos, though all elements can be used. Priests possess a few nice buff and hindering spells and may have a darker side to them. Uses Piety.

Druid: The druid is not a shapeshifter. He is a balancer who has a little bit of every element, and lots of Earth, Life, Order and Chaos. Druids are great regenerators who can have healing over time, though their direct heal spells may disappoint. Druids also possess elemental attacks and even physical moves to use with their druid allowed weapons. Uses Balance.

Shaman: The shaman IS a shapeshifter. They can become strange animals, or just unleash some of the least predictable attacks ever. They have warfare when transformed into animals, and Piety when humanoid. The Shaman has buffs, but sometimes they might debuff the user, and you cant just click dispel yourself either. Shaman attacks or heals might just hurt yourself (to lesser degrees) Uses: Piety (humanoid) and Warfare (polymorphed.)

Warlock: The vile class used by the vile peoples. Warlocks revel in fire and death, though wild air and Chaos magic will tear things apart as well. The warlock can summon demons or undead minions to protect his leather clad body, for he possesses few defensive spells aside from terror magic. Warlocks rarely have those that use them with good intent, though all races tolerate the neccessity of warlocks, even the Eldren can handle the fact that some brownies have taken to this vile magic. Warlocks can use their own health to make more mana, or do the reverse in not very efficient ways. Uses Mana.

Monk: Last and not least, you get Monks... with kungfu grip! Monks have high evasion, naturally high stamina, and great power at a cheap price, too bad that as front liners, they get simple cloth armors only. Monks can master counterattacking and even possess mending skills that are inexpensive, but slow in restoration. Uses Piety and Warfare.



PvP

Pvp servers will never EVER be your faith vs the world. You will always have at least one close ally faith.

These alliances are:
Death and Earth
Water and Life
Air and Order
Chaos and Fire

This is nice, especially because no Chaos race has paladin and no water race has Warlock, so the alliance allows your team access to all classes in some way.

There is also extended ally PvP which adds one more ally faith.

Earth and Order
Life and Air
Death and Fire
Water and Chaos

If you're a chaos player, you can group with both fire and water players, but be aware that you may find heavy group tensions.

Simple PvE servers are open ended, though each faith has one always Kill on sight enemy NPC faith which is often your foe faith, and 2 faiths that you must earn trust with through massive questing.

Faiths also have an alignment label.

Good:
Life
Order
Air

Neutral:
Water
Earth

Evil:
Fire
Death
Chaos

though these prove to be a bit one dimensionalizing.


Weaponry is interesting. There are bound to be an endless amount of knives and staves, some of which may be better for warriors. You'll find Staves that read Berserker only!
It is seperated into several categories.




There are 8 stats: Strength, Dexterity, Agility, Stamina, Intelligence, Wisdom, Spirit and Charisma: Whoa! Aren't we original? By name, no. But you'll find warriors needing wisdom and int if he wants to go against certain foes.


Strength: High strength lets your melee physical attacks hit harder. It also allows you to carry more and heavier items. A few spells are also based on strength so a high strength can actually be good for powerful magic. Expenditure resources thankfully has no weight. So Gold, Crystals and Ale... I'm still trying to figure where to place their value, or how to even fit in Fame. That's neither here nor there.
Races that emphasize: Giants, Ogres and Cyclopses

Dexterity: Good dexterity is good accuracy, whether weapon or spell or dodge, you want some dexterity. Dexterity also increases missile power a bit. Helps some thief skills.
Races That Emphasize: Faeries, Pixies, Imps, Halflings

Agility: Agility is your strike speed, reaction speed, your nimble dodging and deflection. Even magical defense spells can be boosted by agility. It also helps with certain thief skills.
Races that Emphasize: Brownies, Pixies, Centaurs, Faeries

Stamina: This is your health stat, but it also helps you resist certain diseases and poisons. A High stamina also increases your casting time and helps prevent fatigue and increases underwater breathing timer (if your race doesn't have gills)
Races that Emphasize: Ogres, Cyclopses, Rock Dwarves, Minotaurs

Intellect: Your stat for mana. Intellect helps you decipher runes and read scrolls and understand words. It also lets your spells hit harder and helps you avoid certain illusion and elemental magic damage.
Races That Emphasize: Gnomes, Storm Giants

Wisdom: Another mana stat, wisdom is your wits. Your skills will increase faster with higher wisdom, you will avoid mind controls, accuracy reducers, and your spells may last longer than their usual duration. It also helps against stun. Just because a race seems stoopid doesn't mean they aren't wise. It helps you resist arcane magics.
Races that Emphasize: Dryads, Stone Giants, Orcs

Spirit: Your secondary bar revolves around it. Your spirit helps you resist fear, detect invisible enemies, and recover hit points. It helps regen your secondary bar more than any other stat. You'll want some regardless and in general, negative effects may last shorter.
Races to Emphasize: Eldren, Dryads, Halflings

Charisma: Aside from helping you get better quest or reaction results, Charisma cheapens store prices, helps your affinity with your pet, and helps your fear and mind controls last longer, while helping you potentially outright avoid those from the enemy. Higher charisma can also help group synergizing buffs be a bit stronger.
Races to Emphasize: Cyclopses, Dryads, Brownies


You might be thinking these races broken with so many being repeated. Why NOT be a dryad? Well, Dryads lack strength, Stamina and dexterity. They can make good resilience Paladins or casters, but you need to build up on strength items.


Besides which, even with starting stats being as high as 90 or as low as 10, in the long run, items will make these differences less noticable. There will still be a difference, granted, but not by very much.

It is safe to say that every class will need some of every stat. This is an undeniable truth that I want emphasized. Sure, your Fighter needs lots of strength, agility and stamina, but he will enjoy some Wisdom and Intelligence from time to time as well.


Having Charisma gear on before unloading at a merchant isn't a bad idea if you're low on gold.

This game is focused on stats, yes, but you'll find that its very focused on ALL stats.

[Boaster]

I would say that Minotaurs would best fit as a Fire race. Orcs fit nicely in Death, as opposed to Chaos. Trolls, I would say would have to exist as Earth if anything.

Really, as I've suggested in another thread (and this goes off topic, but we're all doing it, so it's okay) is that any race be selectable and depending on what Faith you worship depends on how your character looks.

I.E. Undead/Golgothan Faerie. Fire Troll. Fire Serpent. Chaos Elf.

Though, going in this direction some things wouldn't be possible such as Order, Death, Life, or Chaos Elementals. Or maybe, who knows.

Aside from that, I also think Imps would be better of labeled as Demons.


With stats, I'd say keep it simple. Prime stats: Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom and Charisma.

Strength: Attack/damage, ability to equipped certain weapons.
Dexterity: Defense, evasion/block/parry rate, Ranged Attack.
Constitution: Health, Health Recovery Rate, poison resistance, resistance to physical ailments.
Intelligence: Half mana, determines what strength magic can be used.
Wisdom: Half mana, determines magical strength.
Charisma: Fame bonus from battles, leadership/rally, quest reward bonuses(?).

Other stats like Attack/Hit Recovery rates, Sight radius, movement rate, etc should be separate from the prime stats, because otherwise Dexterity would be the ultimate stat to have (if it were to effect the things listed above, plus the Attack/Hit Recovery, Sight Radius, combat speed, movement).

That's my two cents.

[thandu]

Perhaps I misworded.

Spells cannot miss, but can be resisted. Nimble finger and hand dexterity helps casting become stronger, and thus less likely that your spells will be resisted (partially or even fully.) You cannot 'dodge' spells and dexterity will not help against incoming magic.


I had to make a few odd placements. Sure, Trolls in this incarnation look Earthy, Earth easily has a mountain of other races that can fit into it much more easily.

That's why Orcs were made Death: too many chaos races!

I'm trying to follow the LoM manual, whereupon, such things like fire Elves and Aqua Dwarves don't fit with the story all too well.

I'm going to now expand upon the story a bit.


Death:

The vile scourge of a fiend that is Balkoth has been slain! Warfare has subsided to country feuds and most of the races deal with internal affairs of their own lands.


The people of death suffered most. Even during the war, a Golgothan citizen or militant was terrified of the growing ego of Golgoth and his servant. They had been worked harder than usual, and fates worse than death (or even UNdeath) awaited those who couldn't serve well enough.

For this reason, many fled to their nearby allies, the Dwarves, in hopes of escaping the tyranical diety before incurring his wrath. Many orcs fled the swamps as well, seeking caves and even some resided amongst the barbarians.

With Balkoth's death, Golgoth lost a major grip on the land, and has subsided in his divine intervention. Several faithful acolytes still revere him heavily, though are more cautious with his power.

With his slaughter, the Dwarves attempted to rekindle the trust that Balkoth shattered between the two races and many Golgothans returned home, though their knowledge and several fine stallions remained though in trade, finer arts of crafting and smithing spread within the lands of death.

Orcs were safe to return to the swamp, but they returned not alone. Trolls, filthy wth mud and soil, were intrigued with the idea of filthy swamps with plentiful carcasses to feed upon. With decent strength, the Golgothans welcomed new muscle with regenerative powers into the swamps.

The people of death are slowly shifting to be a bit less... death, some are beginning to realize how valuable breathing existance is, though slaying and enslaving their enemies is never out of the question.


Chaos:

The rugged mountains house tall humans and a variety of feral humanoid of varying sizes and stamina. These peoples deal with the hardships of nature commonly, and therefore are often resistant to elements.

It is common practice for Barbarians (though in rare cases, other races) to travel to the lands of fire, and live and die for the flame. This servitude is a pilgramage, but many find the thrill and energizing heat to be more appealing.

These two races, Fire and Chaos, are very close allies thick and thin.

In recent times, the people of chaos had been in contact with Orcs, who shared their feral ways, but reveled too much in the death of their foes. While cannibalism was an accepted practice, mostly amongst the smaller goblins, the Orcs outright knowledge and revelry in torture and murder scared even some barbarians and their magic was also vile.

In the end, Orcs were banished, though few who preferred chaos remain with and are said to be breeding compatible with humans.

With the recent wars bringing death tallies up, the people of Chaos have been a bit more organized, as new ideas of battle strategies besides overpowering might become more common amongst the craftier goblins and barbarians.

The larger ogres, while lacking of the tongue of common, have proven to be adept in arcane arts as well as the art of face smashing.

The even larger Cyclopses are outright lethal, but their eye holds a certain charismatic charm, and decent perception.


Life:

Golgoth has always despised Llanwyllen and her followers, and has since the dawn of their existence. Golgoth demanded that his elven and undead followers crush the Eldren and their ilk. VERY rarely did any the sentient races ever have any qualms with the idea.

The lush meadows felt the creeping sting of swamp as doom ravaged their lands, which to this day still aren't healed.

Some elves took to the snowy mountains, where cavalry and archery charges could be more precise. Some elves chose to aid the air peoples as well.

The combined might of 7 faiths made Balkoth's conquest a bit short lived, but Elves felt major sting.

The cute Brownie folk were ideal scouts, and learned much as they traversed the new world, but in their journies, they saw some dreadful displays of physical might and destructive fire and even death magic.

Curiosity has proven dangerous, for some these little creatures have taken up deadly summoning magic and feral fighting styles, though their loyalty to the elves remains strong.

Dryads are often more reclusive, preferring to focus on nature and healing, especially with the land dying as it now is.

The people of life remain true to their ways, but Brownies have a dark curiosity brewing within.


Order:

Archons define Order. At a safe distance from Balkoth, Archons were left unharmed, but many did not like his vile desires for destruction. Being charismatic, they traded with many, even learning a few healing tricks for their holy knights. This ideal of the paladin spread to other nations as well.

Centaurs, often wanderers, enjoyed the open grasslands and plains that defined the nation and had very similar militaristic mentalities, making ideal allies for the humans.

As well, Minotaurs, who hid so well as to avoid much conflict, have opened their doors with Balkoth's doom. It is as though these strong yet organized bullmen know something that others cannot see.

Some Archons were intrigued by destructive power, and decided that fiery and death magic, if controlled, could prove useful in the defense of their kingdoms.

Order remains in balance, but is definitely branching out with its safety.


Fire:

Caught in the crossfire of death and life, Fire suffered, and would have been ruined had their Barbarian allies not aided them well.

The fire giants have proved to be a major turning point against the burnable undead. Fire Mages of the giants rained fire and destruction upon the Dark Elves.

Imps were summoned from the inferno core of Urak in droves! Many willingly scouted, others took up other odd jobs. Either way, their numbers were immense! They decided to set up their own towns and become full citizens of the Fire Kingdom. These semi-demons have proven invaluable.

Also invaluable are the Red Dwarves, once crafted by Ancient Earth Gods, the Red Dwarves found volcanic mountains more their home. Slimmer and craftier than Rock Dwarves, Red Dwarves proved clever and agile, if not cruel and pyromaniacal (not that Fire Giants minded) and even artisaned craftsmen.

Lastly, the Lesser Fire Giants, shaped in smaller images of Fire Giants, serve the Eternal fires without question, though many do feel 'lesser' than their creators, but have taken more nimble and disciplined arts to set themselves apart.

Common rumor has it that Lesser Giants are a Human/Giant half-breed, but none have been able to prove it... or disprove it.

Structures suitable for travellers from afar have been built to ease the wild lava, for the Fiery lands need new business from afar to fix recent troubles.


Water:

No land is in a state of econimic and militaristic boom like the Water folk are. Balkoth's attempts at shore raids met storm, beast and fleet alike in combat that overwhelmed his fleets.

The Viantha, also known as Amazons, are matriachical humans. Men do exist, but most have enrolled as cavaliers, sailors or shipwrights. It hasn't been until recently that the Viantha men began desiring men's rights. Success has proven to work, for men of magic and healing and war are now on the rise.

This was likely brought about due to the aquatic lizardmen more recently coming to terms where men and women have begun to prove equality in capacity. Men and women have much different builds amongst the lizards, but determination (and magic) can overcome DNA.

The strangest blessing to befall water has been a strange blessing, Water Giants... well, Lesser Water Giants, Synora, the goddess of water, has brought one hopefully final gift to help clean the world. Lesser Giants in her image.

These giants have seaweed hair and a salty scent, but are decently sturdy. Their beachlike apperance slightly hinders their appeal with other faiths, but the people of life have been close allies, mostly due to the fact that both faiths share a strong capacity for healing.

Water's governments are undergoing a change, and gender bias is starting to fade fast... but is it too fast? Could the Water juggernaut drown itself under all the weight it could gain?


Air:

The clouds were safe, but few enjoy travelling to the windworn and icy cold skies where benevolent Storm Giants live.

Storm Giants are huge, strong and brilliant, but are a bit frail for their size. They are perhaps one of the most goodly races in Urak, and their brilliance and sagely knowledge are legendary!

Faeries are small and clever. They have lots of dexterity, speed, and flight. Fae folk have been important scouts and auxilery in defenses against intruders.

Pixies are wanderers, and rarely travel alone, but they almost invariably return to the cold mountains they love so much. Many are citizens of Air and enjoy the kinship and protection that giants can employ.

The mountains hold dark tales of curses. It is not the cold, but the unnatural chill that a race of green skinned humans called the Witcar hold that keep many from wandering far off the mountain roads.

Witcars, often refered to as the Witch race, live far from the world because it shuns them as abominations. Even still, many manage just fine, but wouldn't have come to agreement with the Giants and winged folk had disaster not struck.

A volcano, a massive one shattered the mountains and rained fire upon the world. With their knowledge of magic, Witcars have offered to help fix the mountains, partly for their own sake, but in trade for an alliance with Giants and some respect. This alliance still seems strong.

Gnomish geomancers have been attempting to determine the cause of the volcano, genuinely enough. Though the Air Folks are enraged by the presence of Earth, these gnomes and their excavators provide their honor that this is not an attempt at an attack.

Some Giants and Winged folk are starting to believe it true and are even helping the investigation. Perhaps it is only a matter of time before the age old battle between earth and air is but a foolish whisper of the past!


Earth:

With good standings with Death, Earth was mostly safe to continue being a major source of exported metallurgy and jewelry.

With Dwarves at the forefront, crafting, building and fighting, few can argue the truth that size really doesn't matter.

Gnomes, also great earth crafters, are perhaps the most magically capable races in Urak, despite being one of the smallest. No magic can escape their mind or capacity, but they are frail and small.

Halflings are less crafty, but are skilled with making and eating all sorts of foods and are sneaky.

Stone Giants, though rare in number, have begun to sprout up and leave the sacred temples their lives have commonly revolved around to be more active in the defenses of Earth lands.

Earth is mostly neutral with the world, though they are friends with death, and have a trade alliance with Order. The people of order trade in fine horses and farm goods, in return for jewelry and fine steel swords and armors.

Gnomes love cheese (this was obviously worth its own line.)

The Earth folks remain in a state of safety, but the rising number of giants could be trouble. Rations, cities and supplies are in higher demand due to the rising numbers of giants, who upset the balance of their meter tall allies. Giants eat a lot, and need bigger platemail. Though small for now, Stone Giants reach adulthood young and live long. They may overpopulate the mushroom cities and lead to starvation and revolt, but nobody dares to have any rivalry yet.




As can be seen, this game would take place some time after the death of Balkoth, perhaps somewhere between 20 and 80 years later.

The world is undergoing a Renaissance and globalization of sorts. Ideas and concepts are spreading, but the peoples still are clinging to faiths and traditions, holding them back and keeping war always around the corner.



Anyways, a concept of half-breeds is being thought of, but it will mess with the balance a bit.

I've determined these races might be able to mix.

Humans (all) can mixbreed with elves, ogres, orcs, Giants, Centaurs and Dryads. Witcars can also breed with goblins.

Dwarves and Elves of one kind can breed with the other kind. The real problem here is that these races are rivals, and just don't want to. Dwarves of either kind and Gnomes are also compatible, but the offspring tends to turn out to be the specie of the mother.

Human races can mix as well, though Barbarians and Archons only tend to be close enough to touch with a hammer to smash the other's face in.

Elves can breed with humans, faeries, and dryads.

Elemental giants cannot mix breed due to elemental composition. This includes lesser giants, but lessers of an element can mix with the greaters: Ie Fire Giants and Lesser Fire Giants can mix.

Orcs can breed with humans, ogres and giants.

Centaurs can breed with humans and horses... we're not even going to GO NEAR this subject.



This concept can confuse a bit and will likely be scrapped. Half-breeds would be confusing to place in the world.



As for stats, for the most part, the 8 I mentioned are stats that at default, differ between race. Other stats are more static, growing maybe with level, but mostly by items.

Spell Hit: Helps your spells hit harder and more often. Dexterity and Wisdom effect this stat.

Dodge: Avoids attacks. Agility helps a lot, dexterity to a lesser degree.

Critical Hit: The chance to score a critical hit, which never misses, deals double damage and ignores armor. Agility and strength determine physical, while Agility and Intelligence determine magical.

Knowledge Retention: While in game and idle with skills, some MIGHT deteriorate. You'll need to swing with your weapon again to keep it high and earn 'insurance', extra points of skills that don't add to your capacity, but can make up for missing time. Wisdom is the core of your wisdom retention, but some helmets help your brain directly retain. Note that forgetfullness will take a while, and doesn't happen if you're logged off.

Regen Rate: How much HP you recover over a set time. Spirit effects this very much so, though Stamina and strength do add some. Direct Regen items are rare and some races like Trolls, Dryads and Lizard Men possess natural bonus regen that even happens during combat.

Weapon Skills: Your skill to hit with weapons of that catergory. The choices are vast. The only way to grow this catergory is to thwack away with the weapon, though higher int helps you become more likely to gain skill points in your strike.


Stealth: Determines your skills at sneaking, whether hidden in shadows or afflicted with some invisibility. Stealth is determined by charisma and dexterity. Charisma's input is your magnetic personality being utilized in reverse, though its attribution is minimal. To be stealthy, wear +Stealth items compared to +Dex



Resistances: There are 11 resistance types to determine how well you handle magical and non-magical attacks that possess elemental properties.


Order: Used for Order spell damage and certain control magics, Order spells tend to have decent damage that doesn't waver in strength. Wild enemies tend to be weak to it.

Chaos: Used to resist Chaos damage, confusions and polymorphs. Chaos damage can be lethal, though it can be weak. The damage is random, and may hurt the user, or heal the user, or heal its target by mistake. Chaos damage is good against constructs because their composition is too well organized to not crumble to disarray.

Death: Used to resist death and shadowy damage and to avoid fear based debuffs and effects. Death damage is strong and may poison, but can heal the undead and many who don't fear death are therefore resistant to its damage.

Life: Life Magic resists life damage attacks and spirit based effects. Life Magic is average, but tends to brutalize the undead and other unnatural creatures.

Fire: Resists fire magic, lava, and burning effects. Fire damage is strong and relentless. Likely, you'll find many fire resistance items and fire has many weakness foes. Those that resist tend to be very troubling. Fire damage may burn a foe, but its rare and light anyway. Be careful at sea.

Ice: Resists ice damage and freezing and chilling effects. Ice damage tends to possess chilling slow effects, but many water and wind creatures are immune.

Water: Resists water damage and choking drown effects. Water damage is uncommon, and usually isn't very single target, but it tends to have added effects such as rusting and is good against fire and some earth based creatures.

Thunder: Resists electrical and sound based thunder damage and certain shock and paralyzations. Thunder is strong, but tends to jump a lot of targets and may have chaotic effects. Strong against sea creatures.

Air: Resists wind and air based damages, stuns and blowback effects. Air Damage is not too common, but tends to be not too strong. Air Damage tends to be multi-elemental with its temperature and based on what its winds carry, ie. Change Wind (Chaos), Hailstorm (Ice, Earth). Useful against Earth foes.

Earth: Resists earth petrification debuffs. Earth damage is not too versatile, but stones pack some physical wallop in case your enemy forgoes that. Its damage tends to be fair, and if an enemy is flying, it is usually very good. Most other elements struggle against earth, except...

Nature: Nature resists nature damage and plant based effects and debuffs. Nature is a favorite druidic power, but elementalists do not lack it at all. Nature damage is fair, and great against the unnatural undead and non-fiery demons. Nature is a great way to beat order, death, water, air and earth, but struggles against fire, ice and chaos.


This is how it looks resistancewise.


Order Magic: Beats chaos and feral enemies.

Life: Beats undead and fearless enemies, as well as some demons. Poor against spirits.

Death: Good against the living that don't fear death and against natural foes.

Chaos: Good against constructs, golems and order creatures. Creatures in organization tend to lose chaos resistance in trade.

Fire: Good against undead, plants and ice foes. Bad against sea creatures.

Ice: Good against fiery creatures and nature, but also good against non-icey dragons and non-aquatic/icey lizards.

Water: Good against stone, fire and metals.

Thunder: Good against watery sea creature, metalic foes, and enemies weak to noise. Horrible against earth and nature.

Air: Decent against flying foes that aren't air affiliated, good against earth, water and Chaos foes.

Earth: Good against flying foes, Thunder and water. Lesser uses against fire and ice but arcane faith foes resist commonly.

Nature: Good against earth and watery creatures as well as the unnatural, including spirits, but not life targets.


You may be thinking that this is a lot of magic... and it is. The game is called Lords of MAGIC after all.

Note that player characters don't start with resistances based on faith, but based on race, if any at all. Lizard Men resist fire and water, but have some thunder weakness, for example.

Most of the more magical or elementally affiliate creatures and giants have magical weaknesses.

Imps resist fire, nature and death, but are weak to ice, water and life.

These resistances and weaknesses are small percentages for the sake of balanced gameplay. Enough so that using Fireball on an Imp Templar is just fine if it's been honed to better skill than your Aqua Drop.



Physical Resistances:

Blunt: Resists blunt weapons. Be wary of spiked weapon, those are blunt/pierce duality.

Pierce: Resists piercing weapons. Daggers and Short Sword count as slash/pierce, as are halberds.

Slash: Resists slashing weapons. Throwing sticks are actually slash/blunt, strangely enough because one end of the stick is sharpened to cut. Feral bites can be all 3... at once!


Missile: Determines missile resistance

Melee: Determines melee resistance.

These stats aren't exclusive, though direct physical resists are rare. Direct defensive stats tend to be more encompassing.




Starting Gameplay

You begin in your starting town, surrounded mostly by those of your race and rare visitors of other races. You do quests related to your race for a few levels and move on to meet your faith sharing neighbors in slightly higher level land. You'll need to do some group based quests at this point if you want good items.

From there, you'll likely hear some NPCs tell you about [Closest Ally] and how they could use your help. You can go quest there if you want, nobody's forcing you either way.


PvP is simple enough. As I've said, it is you and your ally against another duo.

There will also be PvP based games where you'll be team against team, and one for each setup. Story based as well.

For instance, Earth/Death's vs Fire/Chaos is the dispute over a volcano. Rivalling dwarf Species wish to claim a volcano bursting with stone and lava, but none can come to conclusion. With aid from allies, the people will determine who owns the volcano!

Water/Life vs Order/Air, surely 'good' faiths at war is impossible, right? Of course not! There is a mountain forest growing, but the Storm Giants are starting too many avalanches. Dryads and Eldren of the area are ENRAGED to do war and with them, their allies are dragged in as well to determine who owns this grove.

This, is, of course, a rough draft concept.

[Venture Industries]

I've thought a lot about this concept too (LOM MMO). While I like your ideas, they seem very different from mine in many ways, yet there are those similarities. I never had any idea of adding Minotaurs as a race, sounds interesting though. I didn't want to say anything, but I've been working on spells for the 27 Mage classes, and for their various rankings (haven't gone into there specializations yet).

My concept for the world is very diverse game play. This includes climbing to the highest rank of your various Faith, Class, and/or Race as a special leader title. There are only 72 to 81 unique class specific leader titles for all players within the universe. There are currently 81 classes in my concept, giving me 27 mage classes to work with spells on, 27 warrior classes and their skills/spells as well as 27 Rogue classes and skills/spells.

You choose between three major classes: Mage, Warrior, Rogue. From there you choose between nine alliances "faiths". Every alliance (Life, Death, etc.) gives your major class (Mage) access to your subclass (Druid, Wizard, etc.) as you play. From there you can choose various specializations for your subclass. Your subclass inherently becomes your Class there's no need to refer to your "main" class as Mage since it's sorta implied by your "subclass". There are certain racial exceptions to start, but in game play a Fae warrior can cross alliances (faiths) and learn to be a Fire warrior before it chooses a subclass (there may be certain feats it may not do very well or at all).

Any faith/race can party with any other as long as both aren't currently sworn allegiance to the others opposing faith AND the faith's have not declared war. In order to get to the 3rd tier rank and title of the "subclass" you must swear allegiance to the faith (active for 1 fortnight or unless broken). To be fourth tier title you must "become" the alliance, and are "forever sworn to protect the faith", unless broken, in which case you lose your rank and title, some fame and reputation with your people.

There are benefits and disadvantages to races being certain subclasses. Also there are advantages of being "allied" with your faiths subclasses. Each faith has 3 races with one (or more =P) extra race not revealed yet.

[thandu]

That idea makes pvp servers a bit confusing.

The thing with my idea is that the story has grown and time has branched out the ideals of the Urakian peoples.

Each race has a magical affinity with their faith's magic and lesser with some others and a weakness with some opposites. These add percentages to their effects and durations of spells. These are:

Life: Affinity - Nature, Water, Order
Disinterest - Chaos, Death, Thunder

Air: Affinity - Ice, Thunder, Death
Disinterest - Earth, Fire, Chaos

Chaos: Affinity - Thunder, Fire, Nature
Disinterest - Life, Order, Earth

Fire: Affinity - Life, Death, Chaos
Disinterest - Air, Ice, Water

Order: Affinity - Life, Death, Earth
Disinterest - Chaos, Water, Nature

Water: Affinity - Life, Chaos, Ice
Disinterest - Fire, Death, Thunder

Earth: Affinity - Water, Thunder, Nature
Disinterest - Air, Ice, Death

Death: Affinity - Order, Fire, Air
Disinterest - Life, Chaos, Nature


This effects even non-magical attacks that warrior classes may use. You'll find elemental powers all over the place, even in your melee swings.


So, what kind of adventures can you go on?

Well, there're plenty of instances and encounter dungeons.

Instances usually revolve around the story of some dangerous individual who must be stopped. There's usually phat lewt to be had.

Encounter dungeons are different. Encounter dungeons are on a timer, usually random huts with flags above them. An encounter dungeon has a randomly generated enemy group of creatures and villians who must be defeated. If you manage, you'll get a reward item and some money. You'll also get an item you can trade in for faction with the nearest city. These dungeons are usually one large battle with some weaker creatures, a stronger creature, and some NPC humanoids with cheatish amount of leet skill.

The rewards are usually worth it, if you can't equip it, you can sell it to other players, though there are a few that cannot be traded.


These usually restock with another somewhat different encounter within an hour, but you cannot return to the same one until 54 hours (2 and 1/4 real days) have passed.

Instances can be run often, but other than random eneny drops, you cannot sell their magical equipment. Granted, you'll find yourself able to visit instanced dungeons often, but the treasures available are from a fixed reward pool, encompassing best for certain classes in rewards.


A big concern is the shape of Urak, which I will tackle eventually.

[tyr]

I must say, that's one exhaustive list of gameplay stats and rules. I'm impressed. I'm biased towards the faiths not being evil by nature though - even Death has its place - and in LoM the main antagonist is Golgoth and his servant, Balkoth and not the Death units in general.
Any other faith would have been considered evil if they tried to take over Urak and break the balance between the faiths, even a Life Lord.

What kind of gameplay do you have in mind for such an MMO?