Dungeons & Dragons: Dragonshard Interview
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GB: Dragonshard will offer four different playable races - The Umbragen, The Order of the Silver Flame, and two others that are unannounced at this time. Can you detail the goals, strengths, and weaknesses of the first two, and perhaps give us an idea of what the other two might be?
Ed: At this point we're only talking about 2 of the sides in the game. the Order of the Silver Flame and the Umbragen. The Order is a conglomeration of Dwarves, Humans, and a race new to Eberron, the Warforged. Definitely the most familiar of the sides, we wanted at least one side that the player could get into and feel good about very quickly. The Umbragen is a whole other animal. They are a race of Shadow Elves who have returned to lay claim to their birthright. They all have very specialized powers and each of them has a transformation they can undergo to become a different unit giving rise to all sorts of new strategy.
GB: How many different types of buildings and units will the Umbragen and Order of the Silver Flame be able to produce? Can you briefly detail a couple of the more powerful ones?
Ed: Each side has roughly 12 buildings of all shapes and sizes. Each building produces a Captain which can muster a number of Soldier units to band up with him. Although I can't give away too many details at this point, I can tell you that we have three types of units. Champions which are the most powerful and are to be feared by any unit on the battlefield; Captains which are the leaders of squads, can be leveled up to gain new abilities, and serve as the core of the underground adventure parties; lastly, Soldiers are the grunts they group up with Captains to form fighting squads and serve to prevent the captains from being the first to die.
GB: What role will Dungeons & Dragons character classes have in the game? Will all races be able to produce heroes of any class? What advantage do units have when teamed up with a hero, and do such advantages stack when multiple heroes are placed in a single group?
Ed: We've figured out ways of making many of the staple classes meaningful in RTS style play so you'll see a rogue disarming traps and opening locks, you'll see a cleric healing his troops, and so on. We've really taken great strides to bring the flavour of D&D to all of the sides, and although this means that in some cases the soldiers aren't exact translations they definitely will have a D&D feel.
All the races will have Champions (heroes) which they will be able to create and develop. Units that are teamed with a Champion or Captain will inherit some portion of the powers they have. If the soldiers are grouped with a Dwarf Barbarian, when the barbarian uses his Rage ability then all the units with him will get an attack bonus even if it isn't as much as the barbarian himself. We don't allow more than one hero or champion per group, but there are some cases where the powers extend beyond one group and at that point we do allow it to stack.
GB: Aside from battling against other players, will there be any computer controlled monsters that players will be able to fight in order to gain experience and/or treasure? Also, will there be inns, taverns, item shops, or other types of fantasy buildings to visit on certain maps?
Ed: Absolutely, especially in the underground. We provide a whole list of cool monsters right out of the D&D books for players to kill and take their treasure. We are planning special buildings on the maps, but that isn't fully decided yet.
GB: Can you explain how experience will work in the game? Will it only apply to heroes, or will regular army units be able to benefit from experience? Will there be any type of level cap?
Ed: Basically, everything you do earns you experience. Then, you'll be able to spend that experience to buy levels for your Captains. Higher level captains will unlock cooler and cooler powers. Soldiers, the grunts of the army, will not level, but Captains and Champions will. Right now we're considering having a level cap but that will be determined during some early playtesting.
GB: How many spells will players have at their disposal, and will certain spells only be available to certain races? Will such spells be broken up into spell levels, thus requiring players to level their heroes before they become available?
Ed: We're not sure how many spells will be available yet since we keep creating more to add, but they will definitely be limited according to race, and they willl be broken up into levels so that the player has to level his spellcasters in order to get them.
GB: How exactly will magic items work in the game, and will they be usable by heroes only? Will such characters only be able to carry a certain number of items, or will it be dependent on the character's strength? Can you provide a couple examples of magic items players might find?
Ed: Magic items will take two forms, global and individual. Individual items will be usable by any Captain or Champion and will be added to their power list for use when the player wishes. Global items will have their own place on the interface and will be usable at any time by the player. Right now there is no limit on the items, but there will be by the release, we're just not sure what that is yet, and right now we can't reveal the magic items yet, but many will be right out of the DM guide.
GB: Will we be seeing any types of feats or skills in the game, and, if so, will the player have the choice of which abilities his characters will receive when they level up?
Ed: Yes and Yes. :)
GB: We've read that there will be highly coveted areas called "Places of Power", totems that grant continual bonuses, and glyphs that provide one-time bonuses. Tell us a bit about these different objects and how they'll come into play on a map. Can you provide some examples of each and what effects they'll have?
Ed: PoP's and incredibly important strategically. Imagine a totem that is fixed to a location in the underground that grants all your units a +2 to attack as long as you control it. That's incredibly significant to the outcome of the game so now those players are goind to fight over who controls it. What this really means is that we're giving the player more targets of strategic importance across the map; more things on the map to fight over and that creates a more fulfilling game experience.
GB: Will there be a different single player campaign for each of the four races? Also, how many different maps (aside from the single player ones) are you planning to include with the game for multiplayer gaming? Anything else you can tell us about multiplayer?
Ed: Each of the campaigns will be very different and presented uniquely from the side of the race being played. We don't have a final count on the maps since we're planning on building as many as we possibly can, for our fans.
We'd like to issue our thanks to everyone at Liquid Entertainment and Atari, especially Ed and Brandon, for taking the time to answer our questions!
