DISCLAIMER: A warning to all those who didn't yet read the "A Song of Ice and Fire" novels. This thread will probably contain spoilers!

Greetings everyone!

As a predecessor mentioned in another thread before this one concerning a lotr-Mod, it may seem early to start a mod-project due to the game-engine and mechanics not being final and the exact moddability being unknown.

Still, reading about the possibility of building a dynasty and having a pre-implemented vassal system finally convinced me, that Elemental should be quite qualified not to just make any mod featuring the world from GRRM's "A Song of Ice and Fire" novels, but a mod that contains and emphasizes what ASoIaF is really about, the conflict between the major houses.

So what I will do now is:

1. Explain what I would like to focus on concerning the mod itself, of course this is rather a brainstorm than a firm concept

2. Give a short explanation about myself and how I would like to realize this mod

3. Write a section about recruiting people for this mod. Yes, I will need help. If I cannot get enough people to pull this off properly, I would rather cancel the project than make a mediocre mod.

4. Hope that the developers themselves will lookup this thread to answer a few rather generic questions concerning the modding possibilities.

Section 1 - Early Concepts

If you want to comment on those in this thread, please start your thread with something like: "Concerning 1a) and 2c)" so everybody instantly knows what you are refering to.

a ) The World

There are three major possibilities, how to design the actual world map.

First of all, we could just implement the whole world, in which a Song of Fire and Ice is playing. Now I want to early exclude this one, as most of the map would not be detailed out due to lacking lore and if we kept the landmasses really only 10-15% of the map would actually be interesting/playable.

The second possibility is to take Westeros, the free Cities and the slavers bay maybe up to old Valyria. One reason for this is for the House Targaryen to be actually playable from scratch, which is a big factor. Additionally the free cities will add a rich (difficultly conquerable) flavour, the sea dominance will be more important and we would use most of the lore from the novels. But on the other hand only westeros would be REALLY modelled out in great detail, which still could give an awkward feeling in when comparing it to the rest of the map.

The third possibility is, which I currently prefer a bit to the second one, is to focus entirely on Westeros, which would be equally detailed almost everywhere and is supposed to be the center of attention for the mod anyway. We could use the whole space just for it. That would allow us to go as far as we want in detail, especially concerning the many different houses/families and places. If it weren't for Daenerys I wouldn't even ponder about the second possibility. If we stick to the third, we'd either have to model Draenerys Arrival as an event in later game, or choose the moment of her arrival as the start for the game (which is basically inacceptable, concerning that we would miss out a lot of characters and events that happened before.)

So in conclusion as for now I'd take the third possibility. But like every other aspect this will be decided as a developing team.

b ) The Time

We could start a few years before the first book, with the whole rebellion against Aegon. We could start with Daenerys arriving in Westeros, assuming that we only have the main continent as a map. But most probably the best possibility as for given lore and number of events and characters the game should start at the point where the books did. With most of the important charaters alive and a lot of scripted events to happen in the game, so the player does not only play on a map that looks like westeros and uses it's names, but also gets messages (and corresponding game effects) for the tourney of the hand, the death of robert and so on and so on. I will still take any advice, but I guess that most of the team would agree to take this time as a base anyway.

c ) The Lore

One of the main ideas of actually playing in Westeros is of course to have influence on what would will happen. So Eddard Stark can be saved from death. The Lannisters could be beaten Early, Renly could have survived Stannis etc. Still, what I do not want to happen is for this game to have a ASoIaF resembling start and then go all rogue to feel like a simple game of Elemental. So currently I plan to implement a lot of ingame Events that carry the flavour of the ASoIaF world and have some influence on the world, but do not actually force you into the original Story line: Some events could include (these are only examples): The curse of Harrenhal, the Bloody Mummers, the Others, The Brotherhood, Draenerys Arrival, Rediscovering Magic in Old-Town, the Freys disloyalty and so on... I will take and would like a lot of ideas for this. Most important is, that it adds an original feeling, has some kind of influence but is not tightly bound to the main story line of the novels

d ) Factions

The ASoIaF world contains a number of factions apart from the major ones promoting their own kings. Basically every familiy/house that owns an "important-enough-to-model-it" amount of land should be an own faction and the game will make extensive use of the Vassal-System from the original Elemental, more refined if the original system won't be enough and can be modified. While all families can be playable, I would still prefer to focus on the game experience with the major factions playing the game of thrones. Those would include:

- House Stark

- House Lannister (Tywin)

- House Baratheon (Stannis)

- Red Castle (Robert aka Joffrey/Cersei)

- House Tyrell (inluding Renly probably)

- House Martell

- House Targaryen

- House Grevjoy

Those are basically the major players. Who would still be thinkable:

- House Tully

- House Arryn

- Wildlings

and maybe some more. Then again I said, that all factions should be playable. Those shown here are just those which we should focus on.

e ) Gameplay Concepts:

This Section will be further divided with roman numbers.

I) Magic and Magic beings:

As readers of the book will know the magic is slowly returning to the world while the novels develop and has little effect on the world at the start of the story. I would like to keep it similar in this mod. While in Elemental Magic is major factor for about any purpose, in this mod it will only become available lately and will not even remotely reach the powerlevel of an elemental-Souvereign. Draenerys (and maybe Stannis) will have their (limited) amount of dragons, House Stark will have his wargs, Oldtown will have some mages, Stannis will have his red priestress, but those are all unique and non-replacable magic-users. As for production maybe we will go up to enchanting Weapons or small arcane effects and rituals later game. But econimical, political and military power will always be more important than any kind of (replacable) magic power.

II) Families and Characters:

ASoIaF is known for its rich number of interesting characters and their (and their families) interaction with one another. When you start a game in this mod, You will have all the characters, that are directly in control of your faction and they are going to be pretty unique and valuable, featuring their own special abilities and powers (for which we maybe will modify the magic system to work). A lot of the gameplay will focus on those characters and their use in your diplomacy. A big part of the work will be to model and implement the (well, hundreds) of characters of the original series. But this is also what will give a nice ASoIaF feeling to the mod. Making your Jaime Lannister participate in a tourney and win a major price while "accidently" badly wounding Edmure Tully would sure be interesting. This is a very open concept, but I want as much of the gameplay features as possible to evolve around the game characters.

III) Diplomacy

The most important thing in the actual game of thrones IS diplomacy. You won't just start the game, builld some army and then start attacking everyone around you, if you want to win this game. Alliances, Marriages, Treaties and cloak-and-dagger operations are going to be major elements besides the actual military and economic part. Since we have now exact information as of how detailed the diplomatic System of Elemental will be I cannot tell how good this will work or will have to be modified. But even if Elemental is quite detailed in the diplomatic system we would probably even add more flavour if the system is modifiable at all. This is one of the most important game elements and if we develop this mod we should account for it. For example "Claiming Kingship" should be a possible option, while being a vassal to the iron throne should have other characteristics than being a close vassal to another house.

IV) AI

All Factions, if Major or not, will at least have to have their overall behaviour set appropiatly to the novels. House Clegane is going to be pretty aggresive, Arryn will be very shy and uninterested, while Stark will be loyal and true. But even if those abilities are pretty well modifiable the AI will need a lot of work to actually use our modified dipomacy system and characters properly. This is also a bunch of work.

V) World modifiabilty and speed

If a player wants to play this mod, he probably wants to play in Westeros, as it is in the novels. Currently I tend the speed of the game going in months or even weeks of in game time, so that years will take dozens of rounds. This will allow players to scheme, play and finish their game unhurriedly within the context and lore of the novels. So you wouldnt have to worry to quickly use your (quite powerful) Tywin Lannister, because he will drop dead in the next 10 rounds But if we do it like this, that implies that some features will not make much sense, such as creating new cities. Depending on the actual gamespeed maybe this will have to be one of the areas where there will be a compromise between realism and playability. Having your main characters die of age early is no fun. But not being able to create offspring and increase your house is also no fun. This is definately a section where a lot of discussion is needed.

VI) Victory

Well as for a westeros map a victory condition that pops up in ones mind quickly is: "Control the iron throne while being at peace with all remaining factions", but we could add a lot more.

VII) ASoIaF specific new Game Objects:

This is the box of "That'd be cool". Having a unit of bearded priests from novos, having dragonglass as a ressource, valyrian steel as a non replacable seldom material, paying the faceless man for a murder and many more. Those are mostly things that can and shoud be added for a more authenticity but are not a basic concept per se. In order to decide what of these can be done we would have to know the actual details of the engine's tools and whats also important. A person who is good at graphic design.

So much for some early concepts, so you know where this mod is heading and at what it is aiming. As said this is all mere brainstorming and subject to major modifications by the development team.

Section 2 - About me and the realization of the project

Alright, here comes the uninteresting part. My name is Martin, I am 25 year old computer science student from Berlin, Germany. I am what some would call a gamer, having played most genres and a lot of games in the last 15 years often focused on the actual game system and rules. I am great fan of complex systems and synergy. I have a few years of experience in actual implementation of software projects and my studies develop around game-theory, graphs and algorithms, logic and a bit of AI. I am also heavily into literature and roleplaying (pen&paper, larp) and can use some experiences from there concerning story telling. To be honest though leading a project is something that I only know from theory and looking at and I cannot point out major game mods that I would have done so far. It is my fascination for elemental and my fascination for ASoIaF in combination with an unsatisfied urge to create something big  and creative again (I did a bit of writing), that led me to the idea and determination for this project.

What I do know is, that a project of this size, even with a nice and competent team, is hell a lot of work and requires an enormous amount of determination. I am quite sure to have accumulated exactly that over tha last few years. What I can do within this project is:

- Gameplay Modifications

- AI scripting

- Balancing

- Creation of ASoIaF content following the lore

- Leading and organizing the project

Depending on the depth of the modification I could do the gameplay modifications and ai scripts more or less alone, I am pretty sure. I am also quite sure, that I could manage this project solely, but with everything else I need more people and if I don't find enough this little thread will be most of what has happened in the end. I know enough about software engineering that this is far too big for one person's free time.

Section 3 - I need people with determination, skill and a love for ASoIaF

That's right. This is the moment, where I ask you if you would (seriously) like to participate in this project.

a ) What all of you will need:

Independently from what you would actually do in the context of this project, there are requirements that you you would need to fit in.

I) Determination

You need to REALLY want to do this. If your actual thought is "well, giving them an idea or two and maybe help with the abilities of Sandor Clegane", then you can watch the project in the forum that will be hosted for it and be active in the sections for ideas and criticism, but that doesn't make you a team member for the project. Realistically spoken this project will need months and people seriously involved have to take in account at least 10 hours of work a week, if not more. If you are asking yourself why you should do this. Well, I got three reasons: I want to seriously accomplish something, I want to live out my deep appriciation for ASoIaF and to be honest, having participated in the creation of a major mod is probably the single best qualificaton that real game developer studios are asking for (directly taken from a colleague who works in that field). You dont have to have the same reasons, but whatever your reasons are, they have to be strong enough to keep you up for months.

II) Compatibilty

You want to make a mod, you want it to be ASoIaF and you have the determination... but you disagree with most of my concepts at a basic level. Well in this case I would be sorry to tell you, that you cannot participate. I don't imply on all of my ideas, the mod that comes out in the end is a collaboration from the ideas and compromises of the whole team. But in order for such compromises to still be fun and for the team not losing sight of the goal and keeping a feeling of "this is what I wanted it to to" our all overall idea should be the same. So read out the early concepts carefully before you decide to participate. If you are not to sure yourself just ask me.

III) Teamcapabilty

Truth is. I won't get everything like I want it. There are going to be details or concepts that have many possibilities none of which has to be better than the other and maybe the rest of the teams wants it differently then me. This will happen to me and if you participate it will happen to you. If there is even a possibility, that you would quit if you don't get something your way, you are at the wrong place.

b ) Specific Skills:

At this point I must tell you, that you have at least to be able to do one of the following. Someone who just gives ideas and talks about concept is unneeded within the team. All participants will do that anyway and if you think your ideas are truly great, you will still have the possibility to submit them in the forum, but if you want to be part of the team you will also have to work.

I) Coding:

I guess that I can get most of the coding done by myself, but it will always be prone to error if no one else looks at it. So I need at least one person who deems himself able to learn the modding-languages of elemental and help me coding abilities, AI, techs and other under-the-hood work.

II) Knowledge:

You didnt just read ASoIaF, but loath it ? You are a paragon if it comes to ASoIaF knowledge. You visit community sites and read or write the wikis for it etc? To make it short. If you REALLY know a lot about ASoIaF (more than just having read it once) you could join us and provide descriptions and lore for ingame objects as well as helping us design the game elements to correspond with the actual lore

II) Graphic Design:

It's a pain but I cannot do it. I know that some people can. My fiancee is skilled with artwork, so icons and similar stuff would be no problem. But if it comes to 3d-models, faces etc. we need a pro or at least a skilled hobbyist. I guess we need at least two, but more would give us more space for implementation of more aspects. Main target will be the individualization of the characters, secondary targets are special units, builidngs or even spells

III) Sound Design:

This is rather optional than a must have. It could be nice if we got some ASoIaF specific sound at least for the major characters. For music, sound effects and similar we would probably use the engine anyway.

IV) World Creation

Finally we need people who are willing to learn how to make use of the modding tools themselves in order to create the world, cities, characters, factions in the game that do not have to be modified on a code level. Many places for people here.

V) Quality Assurance

This mainly includes a top skill in the use of English language. I guess that mine is sufficient for communication, but if it comes to correct phrasing and grammar within the game itself, it is probably beyond me. So anyone willing to basically correct and phrase the whole projects ingame text is welcome

If you are seriously interested in participating either send me a pm in this forum or an email to silberfang@gmx.net. No matter what way of contact you choose I would like a short description of who you are and more detailed what you can do, what you want to do and most importantly why you want to do it.

Section 4 - Questions to the Devs

Well, if you are a dev reading that, then I already feel honored. If you read the whole threat instead of just this section you know exactly what this is all about and if you are a big fan to ASoIaF you'll maybe even seriously support this project. But even if not, I would have a few questions, that you probably can answer, which are important even while early conception:

a ) Moddability:

If you find the time please answer to the following topics if they are modifiable. An array of possible answers would be completly sufficient: Not moddable, at Codelevel, at Scriptlevel or even Toolsupported

- Diplomacy System

- Family/Charactersystem

- AI

- triggered events

- unique units

b ) Project support:

It would be nice to know if Stardock is going to at least host specific forums for major mods and how far the process of modding will be documented and explained in manuals/videos. An ETA for your modding tools and an information which of the tools that you use will not be available to us would also be important for planning the project.

c ) Validation:

This is optional. But if you would take the time to read the early concepts you could give us good information, what will be rather hard to do and what will be more or less already baseline for elemental. Since you have a decent look at your own developing process you could just give us an estimate on how much work this will be or which goals are probably almost impossible to achieve.

Alright, I guess this is it for now. What happens now mainly depends on, if we can gather up a team that has a chance of doing all this. I will update the thread regularly to keep you informed how many people are already involved. You can also start discussing the concepts as long as there is no specific forum, but dont go into to much detail. This is all baseline.

Hopefully this is going to be more than a schematic ^.^

Katerchen