CBU Developer's Journal

[Adam Ryland]

This thread will be for the CBU Developer's Journal. For those of you who are not familiar with how these work, I'll be doing a series of posts between now and the game's release explaining the concepts involved, talking about the design process, and doing a deep-dive into the details of each feature.

Normally the journal starts quite close to the scheduled release and has a new entry every week day, but as this one is starting much earlier it is instead going to be more ad hoc - probably one entry per week, at least for the time being.

Questions and comments are welcome, I'll try and get to as many as I can (workload permitting), there will be a thread specifically for that elsewhere in the forum.

Table Of Contents

#1 The Basic Concept & Brief FAQ
#2 Issue Content
#3 Characters (Part 1)
#4 Characters (Part 2)
#5 Artifacts
#6 The Game Universe
#7 Storyline and Reactive Events
#8 Character Linkers, Relationships, Editor Tools
#9 Entering Into Combat And Puzzles
#10 Combat (Part 1)
#11 Combat (Part 2)
#12 Combat Examples
#13 Progress Update
#14 Puzzles
#15 Factions
#16 The Remaining Major Screens (Part 1); Game Stats And Past Issues
#17 The Remaining Major Screens (Part 2); Options
#18 Progress Update
#19 Non-Update Update
#20 Release Details

[Adam Ryland]

#1 The Basic Concept

As people will be far less familiar with this series than my other games, I thought it was best to start by going over the very basics of what the game will be like. This is definitely aimed at just being an overview, we'll be drilling down into the actual specifics in dedicated entries later on.

Firstly, to reiterate what was said in the initial announcement and avoid any confusion, it is important to note that CBU is not a direct sequel to CBH. It's got a similar flavour, some crossover in terms of mechanics, and a large number of the same characters will reappear, but they're two different products and CBU was written from scratch. Therefore, if you've already played CBH, it's best not to assume that anything from the game will be the same unless I've confirmed it in these journal entries.

So, the central premise of CBU is that you will be entering into a detailed game universe made up of characters (who can be heroes, anti-heroes, villains, wildcards (people who can flip between good and evil) and civilians), locations, powerful artifacts, factions, etc. As with my other games, pretty much everything can be tweaked or changed via the provided editors and options menus, and as the game plays out you'll see things change; characters will turn traitor, get more or less popular, develop new relationships, join or leave different factions, die, return to life....and so forth.

In CBU you will not be playing a specific character, instead you'll be taking control of the forces of good. At the heart of the game is the Balance Of Power, which is a scale that goes from Order and Justice at one end to Evil and Chaos at the other. As the game progresses, this scale will move in one direction or the other based on how you do; if it ever reaches either extreme end then that side will get to trigger a Battle For The Universe and try to land a definitive victory and win the game. I think this is unique for my games, being able to actually achieve a definitive win, but there is the option to then continue on so that people don't have to worry about their game world ending.

While this goal to work towards is important, the game is aimed towards allowing the player to immerse themselves in the game world and enjoy seeing (and influencing) how things play out.

The Structure

The game plays out in terms of volumes and issues. Each volume consists of sixty issues. Each issue will take the form of one piece of content, which will be decided by an on-screen die roll at the start of play. This could be a mission to stop a villain (which in itself may be made up of multiple parts of combat and / or puzzles), a piece of character progression, an advancement of a storyline, the game world changing in some way, etc.

The volumes and issue structure is also used to limit certain events. For example, some characters may not appear until a certain point in time.

Combat & Puzzles

The meat of the game are the content types that involve you actively controlling your team of heroes against a villainous side, either in physical combat or pitting your wits against them in a puzzle-type contest. You will put together an appropriate team based on a roster of available characters, often choosing them for specific skills or abilities that will be useful in that particular situation, and then compete.

Combat is turn-based with a strategic edge, as you select which powers or abilities to activate, who to target, where to position yourself, etc. These encounters vary from all-out smackdowns to short, sharp skirmishes, to timed 'defend against the odds' missions. Success or failure can affect future segments (for example, losing may allow the other team to spend more points on their team in the subsequent battle) as well as ultimately the Balance Of Power.

Puzzles work in a similar turn-based way, but instead of fighting you are aiming to solve a problem posed by a villain in a limited-time situation.

Of course, what happens in these encounters has a big impact on the game world; relationships will develop based on interactions, characters may end up being hurt, killed, or 'turned' to the other side, and so forth.

A Note On Dice vs Percentages

A lot of CBH's gameplay utilised percentages, for example having powers that made it X% more likely that you'd succeed. Based on the feedback, a lot of people felt uncomfortable with the maths involved. To address this, CBU instead revolves around die rolls, as you may be familiar with from RPGs. Everything happens on-screen and the player can always see all the calculations, so this should make the whole process much easier to understand and more transparent for all players. This is also one of the ways in which CBU feels radically different from CBH.

Going Forward

That concludes a very basic overview of what the game is about. In future entries I'll be going into more detail and talking about some of the thinking behind design elements. I'll finish with a brief FAQ just to tick off some of the common questions that are always asked.

A Brief FAQ

When is the game coming out?

We're tentatively aiming for late summer 2022. A more precise date will be announced as we get closer.

What will the price, available platforms, etc, be?

The price hasn't been decided yet. It will follow the same pattern as all my recent games in being PC only and protected by Elicense. There are no plans for it to be on Steam at this time.

Will it follow TEW2020 in being a larger game window?

Yes, it will be the same dimensions as TEW2020, so if your monitor can run that game then you will be able to run this one too.

Can I convert CBH databases and save games?

A converter is included to turn CBH databases into CBU-compatible versions, but it should be noted that as the games are very different you will need to do some editing afterward to really take advantage of the new features. Save games cannot be converted or continued due to how different the two games are.

Will I have to resize all my character pictures?

No, CBU uses the same picture sizes as CBH. There will be several new categories of picture, however, and these will be talked about ahead of time so that people can locate and cut them if they wish to have them ready for the game's release.

[Adam Ryland]

#2 Issue Content

As previously discussed, the game structure is divided up into volumes of sixty issues. Further to this, there is a subdivision where each set of six issues is known as a Trade Paperback.

When you start a new issue, the content type is based on a dice table that runs from 2 to 12 (i.e. the result of rolling two six-sided dice). There are six tables, one for each part of the Trade Paperback. This allows the content to change depending on where you are. For example, the first issue might generally feature gentler challenges, the middle issues may be more about game world development, then building towards a difficult fight for the sixth issue.

These tables are set up by the database maker, are fully editable, and can change during gameplay.

The different available content types are:

Villainous Scheme (General, Major or Minor): The meat of the game, this is where a villain tries to execute one of the schemes that they have been set to be allowed to use. This can consist of one or more parts of the various combat and puzzle encounters. Whether it's General, Major or Minor refers to which levels of villain are eligible to take part.

Heroic Quest (General, Major or Minor): Heroic quests are the inverse of villainous schemes; they work in the same way, but instead of focusing on a villain, it is built around a hero and one of the quests that they have been set to be allowed to use.

Titanic Tussle: This is a one-on-one combat encounter between two characters who have been set as having the Titanic attribute.

Monster Of The Week / Freak Of The Week: In these types of content, a villain with either the Monster Of The Week or Freak Of The Week attribute is selected and they engage in a combat encounter against a team of heroes. These can be used to simulate the older style of comic where the heroes would meet, fight, and ultimately defeat a different threat each week, or, potentially be useful for reflecting some TV shows like Buffy.

Game Universe Progression: This is a meta type, as it gives a 60% chance of triggering a Character Progression and 40% of triggering a Faction Progression. These are covered next...

Character Progression: This picks a single character and, depending on their settings and an element of randomness, will see them change alignment, change popularity, undergo a change / evolution of their character (this will be covered in more detail when we look at Characters later in the journal), or experience a relationship change (whether adding a new one or altering an existing one).

Faction Progression: This picks an active faction and evolves its membership, either by bringing in a new member or by having someone leave.

Faction Fight: This content type sees two active factions engage in a combat encounter for supremacy. This can consist of one or more parts.

Storyline: One of the storylines from the database will progress in this content type. This will be looked at in more detail when the Storyline data is unveiled later on the journal.

Debut New Character: In this content type, a character who is currently set as Yet To Debut will enter the game universe.

Publisher News: This (slightly meta) content type simulates happenings to the publisher itself; this could be characters getting boosts because they're starring in a new movie, major or partial reboots, comic book sales affecting certain characters, etc.

Random Choice: This launches one of the other content types at semi-random (in the sense that the more popular types like Villainous Schemes have far more chance of cropping up than the more obscure content like Publisher News).

Skip Turn: This is included more for completeness than anything, it simply generates no content and allows the game world to advance as normal.

Bear in mind that as the dice tables are fully editable, the database maker does not have to use all of these types, so if a content type doesn't fit the vibe of a specific database, it's easy to leave out.

[Adam Ryland]

#3 Characters (Part 1)

In this entry we'll be looking at the basic settings for characters (i.e. what you'd see if you opened the editor for a character), plus three of the subsections. The remaining subsections will be in part 2.

Basic Settings

Editor Name: This is how they're shown in the editor; this is a separate name to allow for multiple versions of the same person.

Official Name: This is their 'proper' name and is how they'll appear in any lists within the game. Only one active character can have the same official name at any point in time, but that does mean that you can have multiple characters in the database. For example, if you were making yourself a Marvel database, you could have multiple characters called 'Mr Fantastic', each representing a different stage of Reed's career, and swap between them as the game progresses.

Game Name: This is what they're called during issues. It will often be the same as the Official Name, but as the game name does not need to be unique this has the advantage of allowing for multiple people with the same 'codename' to not need further separation. For example, if you were making a Marvel database you could have both Peter Parker and Miles Morales using the game name of Spider-Man so that you wouldn't have to see him being called 'Spider-Man (Miles)' during combat, which would look a little ugly.

Linked To: This will be covered in more detail later, but effectively you can link multiple versions of the same character together so that you don't need to create duplicate relationships, faction membership, etc, for each version.

Picture(s): As with CBH, the character can have a smaller head shot and a larger full body picture.

Description: This is the character's biography.

Current Status: This includes options like Active, Jailed, Yet To Debut and Dormant. (Dormant means they're not currently in the game world, and is effectively a 'waiting' mode for alternate versions of characters, those that require a specific trigger to become active, etc).

Character Type: This sets them as either an Individual, Grouping, Generic Individual or Generic Grouping, and affects how they're referred to in text.

Character Class: This sets them as one of 9 classes; Human, Mutant, Metahuman, Alien, Technological, Supernatural, Undead, Elemental and Animal. This works in conjunction with other game effects.

Rating: This rates the character in terms of their power in combat, ranging from half a star to thirty stars. This is used in relation to team selection and restrictions to balance the game.

Alignment: This can be Hero, Villain, Anti-Hero, Wildcard or Civilian and is used in conjunction with other game effects. The player will only be able to use Heroes, Anti-Heroes and currently-heroic-leaning Wildcards during combat.

Switches: This sets which alignments the character can possibly change to during gameplay.

Popularity: This is the character's name value and ranges from Iconic to Obscure. It is used in conjunction with other game effects.

Gender: Male, Female or N\A. This is used for text generation and other game effects.

Age: Child, Teen, Adult, Elder, N\A; this is used for certain game effects.

Combat Type: This is either Primary Attacker, Secondary Attacker, Cannon Fodder, Support or Non-Combatant. It is used for team selection and combat AI.

Base Location: Characters can either be set to a specific location or to a more general combination of area, timeframe and dimension. This comes into play with travel and who they can interact with.

Appearances: Permanent, Occasional or Rare. This governs how often the character will become inactive. It's useful for major characters who turn up only for big events.

Min Team Size: This is used in relation to AI team selection and allows you to create one man armies, etc.

Villain Team Ups: This sets who a villain can have on their team, for example limiting them only to Allies and Mercs.

Will Work For: This sets who a villain will agree to work for, for example limiting them only to Allies or Nobody.

Mercenary: Yes or no, this is used in conjunction with team building.

Killing Stance: This sets how likely the character is to kill, and is used for calculating the probabilities of what happens when they KO someone in combat.

Capture Settings: This sets the choices for what happens when a villain is knocked out, such as setting them to be committed to an asylum, jailed, etc.

Death Settings: This sets the possible alternative consequences if a characters is knocked out, such as death, being destroyed, driven away, etc.

Relationships: With men, with women, with none, or with any. This is used when romantic relationships are being generated or affected.

Identity Switch

This section allows the database maker to add multiple records that have a trigger (such as Hero To Villain, Wildcard To Anti-Hero, or Character Progression), an action (either Alter Current Alignment or Switch To New Character), a frequency, and settings for what data is carried over (such as their location).

This allows the setting up of automatic changes. For example, if you were making yourself a DC mod, you could set Two-Face to have a Villain To Hero trigger that makes his Two-Face version dormant and swaps him to a Harvey Dent version. Whenever the game encountered that trigger, it would make that specified change. By setting different frequencies, you could have characters have multiple potential end points for who they turn into.

Travel Settings

A character's travel settings contain a Type that indicates how often they move around (ranging from Permanent, through Occasional Wanderer, to Tourist), 12 settings for how likely they are to visit each location type (such as Modern Urban, Fantasy, Mythological), settings for whether they can travel between areas, timeframes or dimensions, and whether they are linked to always follow a certain other character. Taken as a whole, these give the database maker the ability to fine-tune a character's movements.

Dialogue

Those who have played CBH will be familiar with this section, which allows the database maker to include lines of dialogue that are linked to specific triggers (such as "Is Hit By A Power") and how likely it is to then fire ('frequency'). These can then pop-up during encounters to add extra flavour to the game.

[Adam Ryland]

#4 Characters (Part 2)

In this entry we'll be looking at the final four subsections that weren't covered in the previous part.

Health, Combat Skills

Each character can have up to five health levels, with one as the absolute minimum. During combat, the character starts at level 1 and then falls to the subsequent level once all his or her health as been depleted from that level; once they're out of health levels, they're knocked out. Each health level is made up of:

Level Name: This is cosmetic, being displayed during combat so that it's easy to see where the character is, health-wise.

Health Points: This is between 1 and 12 and is how much damage they can take at that level.

Re-Rolls: This is how-many re-rolls of die that the character can use at that level.

Attack and Defence Values: These are paired up into Melee, Range, Mental and Outsmart and can be between 0 and 25. These are used during combat.

Additionally, these health levels are tied to a character's powers too, as each power can be set to be active at one, all, or some of these health levels. For example, you might have someone who can fly for their first two health levels and then lose that ability for the remainder, simulating them becoming too beat down to continue soaring.

This system allows for a lot of flexibility, as you can have people get weaker over time, have peaks and troughs, have many or few health levels, etc.

Puzzle Skills

These consist of three unique pairs of attack and defence values - Wits, Mystical and Technological - plus the Outsmart pairing from level 1 of the Health and Combat skills. These are used during puzzle encounters. There are no health levels as characters cannot be hurt during puzzles, so you there's no rising or falling of values.

Powers, Abilities, Traits

As the name suggests, this is where each character is assigned their various powers. These are chosen from a huge list of possible choices, each of which gives specific variables that the database maker can customise to make them fit that person. The following covers most of the variables, but it is important to note that they are always context specific and so not every power uses every variable.

Power: The base power chosen from a list; this is things like Melee Physical Attack, Telepathy, Flight, Boost Ally Range Defence, Has Spaceship, etc.

Name: This is the custom name that is used during gameplay (it defaults to the name of the base power).

Category: This is either Uncopyable, Copyable Physical Action, Copyable Tactic, Copyable Innate Ability, Copyable Magic or Copyable Technology; these are all used on conjunction with other 'steal' powers.

Health Levels: This sets whether the power is available at each of the five possible health levels.

Activation Roll (Min / Max): If this is anything other than 1 and 6 then it means that in order to use a power the character must roll a 1D6 and get a result between the min and max values in order to successfully activate it, otherwise the attempt fails. This is useful for simulating hard-to-use powers or to make some powers more or less likely to work - for example, you could make a 'dodging' power only work on the roll of a 6 for a lesser character, but 4-6 for a fresh, more powerful character.

Damage (0-12): This is how many points of damage it does.

Min Damage (0-12): This is the minimum number of points that can be done even if the opponent is using powers that reduce damage.

Self Damage (0-12): This is how many points of damage the user takes just for activating the powers.

Miss Damage (0-12): This is how many points of damage the user takes if it fails to hit, useful for things like missed charges, etc.

'X' Amount: Certain powers have an X in their description. For example, Hunter Of Mutants reads 'When this character attacks a mutant target they reduce the target's defence score by X'. This variable allows you to set what X will be, between a certain min and max value (the values change depending on the power).

Max Targets: This is how many characters can be targeted at one time by the power.

Usage Limit: This is the number of times the power can be used by this character per encounter; it can be between 1 and 100 or left as unlimited.

Action: This sets whether the power 'costs' an action or not; this plays into the combat system and will be explained when we explore that part of the game in a later entry.

Extra Effect: This sets whether the power has any additional benefits, like automatically stunning the opponent, doing an automatic 'outsmart' of their powers, etc.

Stun Loss: This sets whether the power can be used even if the character using it is currently stunned.

Outsmartable: This sets whether an opponent can use an 'outsmart' attack to effectively 'turn off' this powers, making it unavailable.

There are also a handful of exclusive, context-specific variables for particularly strange / unusual powers; for example, you can set the Location for a power which gives the character specific boosts if they're in a certain place, or set Generates for character who can produce minions during combat.

Overall, the system is designed to be extremely flexible so that you can recreate virtually anything that you'd find in comics. You can use the same power multiple times per character to give certain effects too; for example, you might give them a standard melee attack on health level 1 that does 4 damage, then the exact same power on health level 2, using a different name, that only does 3, thus simulating that they're slowly getting weaker as they are damaged.

Schemes, Quests

Each character can have any number (including zero) of schemes and quests; this informs the game what content to generate when that character is the focus of an issue. Schemes are for villains, quests are for heroes. These are selected from a list of possible choices that includes things like Civilian Kidnap, Robbery, Eco-Terrorism, Takeover Dimension, Liberate Location, Patrol, etc.

When adding via the editor the database maker can select a custom name for each, choose the frequency, and say whether it's a 'mastermind' scheme (which means that the villain will tend not to reveal themselves until the final part).

Cloning

As a closing note, the editor also includes a Clone button that allows you to automatically pick a target character, any or all of the sections we've discussed in the previous two entries, and clone the data to a different character. This makes editing a lot easier, especially when creating alternate versions of the same person, as you can just take the bits and pieces that you need without having to make an entire copy.

[Adam Ryland]

#5 Artifacts

In this entry we'll be looking at the artifacts section. Artifacts are items of power that give the holder stat boosts and / or special powers. Characters can either start the game holding an artifact or they can gain them during issues (there are schemes and quests relating to going after them or trying to take them off someone else), and they automatically lose them once they're defeated. If you're making a real world database, you'd use artifacts for things like the Infinity Gems, the Mobius Chair, etc.

As with characters, we'll look at how things are laid out in the editor.

Basic Settings

Editor / Official / Game Name: These work the same way as those discussed in the character section.

Picture: A 200x200 image of the artifact.

Description: This is a piece of text explaining what the artifact is.

Current Status: Active or Inactive, this says whether the artifact is currently in the game world or not.

Possessed By: This is who begins the game holding the artifact (if any).

Eligible Holders: This sets whether heroes, villains or both can try and possess the artifact during issues.

Combat Oriented: Yes or No, this stops non-combatants from going after artifacts that give purely combat-related advantages.

Star Boost: This says how much a character's star rating is boosted if they hold the artifact; this allows the game to recognise that someone is more powerful when possessing an item.

Locked Location / Area / Timeframe / Dimension: This locks the artifact to a specific place, meaning it won't pop up in the 'wrong' place.

Artifact Types: It can be one or more of the following types; Technological, Mystical, Cosmic, Elemental, Futuristic and / or Divine. This is used in conjunction with schemes and quests to make sure characters are only going after artifacts that make sense to them.

Combat And Puzzle Boosts

This section consists of 14 values that add between 0 and 5 to a character's skills if they hold the artifact. These are the combat and puzzle scores, like Melee Attack, Range Defence, Wits Attack, etc, that were covered in the previous entry. This allows someone to be 'powered up' by the artifact.

Powers, Abilities, Traits

This section is identical to the one that a character has; it's the list of powers that are associated with this artifact. When a character possesses the artifact they get access to these. For example, if you were making a Marvel database then you might make a Time Gem artifact and have it give the holder dodging powers to simulate them being able to slow down time.

Cloning

As with characters, artifacts also have cloning available in the editor, making things easier for the database maker.

[Adam Ryland]

#6 The Game Universe

In this entry we'll be looking at the five elements that combine together to create the game world. For those of you who have played CBH, note that a lot of this is identical to how it worked previously, as there was no point reinventing something that worked really well already.

The A-T-D System

The central concept that underpins everything is the A-T-D system, which stands for Area, Timeframe, Dimension, each of which has its own separate section of the editor. Areas can be anything the database maker wants (planets, countries, etc), while the other two are self-explanatory. Each contains:

Name: Which must be unique.

Picture: An image to represent it.

Active: Whether it's currently part of the game.

Controlled By: Whether a character (usually a villain) has taken control of the place. If they do, they get bonuses whenever they are in an encounter based there.

Description: A short bio.

Entry Criteria: This is a list of pre-written rules, which can have as few or as many as necessary, which precludes certain characters from entering this place from another. For example, you may set a minimum popularity level.

As with all the other editor sections, there is a Clone button to allow you to take parts from other items.

Everything within the game universe is located as being in some combination of Area - Timeframe - Dimension. This allows characters from multiple different worlds, times, or places within a multiverse to all exist in the same game without bumping into each other (unless they've got a reason to, like time travelers).

Locations

Locations are generally cities, states, or significant places. They're effectively 'one level down' from the A-T-D structure. In the editor, they consist of:

Name (Editor / Official / Game): These are as described in previous entries.

Picture: As with others, this is a representative image.

Description: A short bio.

Active: Whether it's currently considered 'in' the game universe.

A-T-D: Its position within the A-T-D system.

Type: These are things like Modern Urban, Rural, Supernatural, and works in relation to a character's travel settings.

Pull: From Extremely Low to Extremely High, this affects how likely characters are to go to it when they're traveling.

Use 'In': This sets whether characters will be spoken about as being IN the location or ON the location. It's purely cosmetic.

Hide Location: The database maker can choose to set the location as hidden, in which case it's not shown on any lists (but can still be active). This is, again, for cosmetic purposes.

Controlled By: This works the same way as described above for the A-T-D entries.

Entry Criteria: This works the same way as described above for the A-T-D entries.

Possible Content: This is a list of tick boxes that says what sort of issue content can take place in this location. So you'll see entries for Drug Smuggling, Robberies, Magical-Related Crimes, Standard Combat, etc.

Terrain: These are five options that can either be allowed or disallowed; Flight, Taking Cover, Shadow Usage, Ranged Fighting and Sniper's Nest. This directly relates to what positions and effects are available to characters when fighting in this specific location.

Environmental Roll: This is a table of 2D6 results (i.e. the result of two dice being rolled; 2-12) and the effects of each. These are things like Thick Smoke, Random Explosions, Unstable Terrain, etc, plus No Effect. When combat happens in this location, right at the start, two dice get rolled and the listed effect is then used to modify combat for the rest of that encounter. This allows you to add a little more flavour to each location. (Note that if all eleven are set to No Effect, the dice roll is skipped.)

As with the others, there's also a Clone button to grab content from existing locations.

Sites

Finally we come to Sites. These are essentially 'sub-Locations'. These have no bearing on travel or where a character is, but are used during issues to allow the action to 'zoom in'. For example, if you are in the Location of New York, combat may happen within Central Park, a Site within that Location. Note that a game does not need any Sites; they're entirely optional.

Sites work in exactly the same way as Locations, with all the same elements in the editor, but with a Location instead of A-T-D, and the addition of two new pieces of data: Prison and Asylum, which are both Yes / No choices. Setting some Sites as being prisons or asylums means that they can be used for specialist jail break / spring from institution crimes where villains can free their incarcerated buddies.

When an encounter takes place in a Site, the Site's data replaces the Locations. For example, you may have London as the Location, and have it allow for ranged fighting and weapon smuggling, but have combat happen inside the National History Museum where ranged fighting and weapon smuggling is prohibited. This allows you to have a richer variety of environments to encounter during gameplay.

Sites have a Clone button too, and also have buttons that allow you to copy the parent Location's data quickly as well.

So, with these five elements you can structure a game universe with as much or little detail as you want, and by working with characters' travel settings you can keep various different worlds, publishers, or variations apart if necessary.

[Adam Ryland]

#7 Storylines and Reactive Events

In this entry we'll be looking at two game elements that allow for some story-telling possibilities.

Storylines

As covered in entry #2, storylines are triggered when the Storyline content type is rolled as that issue's focus. The following is what you'll see in the editor:

Editor Name: The unique name that identifies it in the editor.

Story Heading / Body: The heading and body text that appears when the storyline is shown to the user in a pop-up window.

Recap Heading / Body: The heading and body text that appears when looking back through previous issues.

Picture: The image that will accompany the storyline; this can be any of the valid types (character, artifact, faction, etc).

Frequency: How likely this storyline is to be picked compared to all the others.

Single Usage: If Yes, the story can only happen once, after which it is ignored.

Precursor: Optionally you can choose another storyline that must have already happened before this storyline can be used. This allows you to create sequential storylines.

Cannot Follow: Optionally you can choose to set it so that the storyline cannot happen if a specific other storyline has already happened. This allows you to create branching storylines.

Not Before: This gives a volume and issue number that stops the storyline from happening before they have been reached. This allows you to delay storylines to specific times.

Requirements: You can have any number of requirements per storyline (including zero). Each acts as a check that must be 'passed' for the storyline to be valid. You pick from a list of pre-written options (such as Character Status Must Be Active, Character Cannot Be Active Member Of Faction, Artifact Must Be Possessed By, etc) and then fill in the relevant characters, artifacts, etc, depending on what you've chosen. You can use the requirements to create branches in storylines or to have them sit idle until specific criteria are met.

Effects: This is a list of things that the storyline does when it is used, and can have as many or as few effects as you want (including zero). Again, you select from a list of potential effects (such as Switch Character's Identity, Move Character To Location, Character Becomes Faction Leader, etc) and fill in the relevant information.

There's no limit on how many storylines you can put into a database, so there's an enormous amount of potential for creativity. You can also use them to simulate events that happened in real comics, or use them to add colour to the game by generating storylines that don't actually do anything tangible but have flavourful text.

Reactive Events

Reactive events are very similar - almost identical - to Storylines, but with one key difference; every Reaction Event is checked at the end of each issue, regardless of what the content was, and will be activated if their requirements are met (meaning multiple Reactive Events can occur per issue). This allows the database maker to create effects if certain situations occur during the game.

In the editor, the differences are:

Frequency: Instead of being used to decide which Storyline is chosen, this becomes a measure of how likely the Reactive Event is to happen if its requirements are met. This adds an element of randomness to when something might trigger.

Precursor / Cannot Follow: These do not exist for Reactive Events due to the difference in the way they trigger compared to Storylines.

Not Before: Reactive Events have an additional piece of information, Not After, which allows the database maker to cap both the earliest and latest that it can trigger.

Everything else remains the same.

Reactive Events are there to allow the database maker to create trigger-points. To take some real world examples, you might make one that triggers upon the requirement of Robin turning into Nightwing and has the effect of debuting Jason Todd, or, you could make one that has the requirement of Spider-Man possessing the Venom symbiote artifact and switches his identity to his black-suited variation. In both cases you could also do the same thing via a Storyline, but using Reactive Events means that you can set it to happen immediately rather than trusting in the luck that the Storyline will happen to be selected at a time when that requirement is true.

[Adam Ryland]

#8 Character Linkers, Relationships, Editor Tools

In this entry we'll be looking at the two remaining parts of the editor that haven't yet been discussed in detail, Character Linkers and Relationships, and doing a quick confirmation of what other tools are available for database makers.

Character Linkers

As discussed previously, characters have a Linked To field that allows them to be bound together. A character linker has the following information:

Name: The name used in the editor.

Factions, Relationships, Stats, Usage Tracking: Each of these are a yes or no answers. If they're set to yes, this means that all characters who are linked together will update themselves after each issue to have the same information.

To give a real world example, if you had three characters - Spider-Man (Original) as the active character, plus Spider-Man (Black Suit) and Spider-Man (Iron Spider) starting as dormant - and they were all linked to a character linker called 'Peter Parker' with factions set to Yes, then if Spider-Man (Original) joins the Avengers then the other two versions will also be set to have joined; this means that if Spider-Man then changes to his Iron Spider variant then he won't lose his Avenger membership.

To clarify, 'Usage Tracking' relates to another in-game feature that stops players over-using specific characters; this will be explained in more detail when we cover the various options.

Relationships

Relationships are unchanged from CBH. They consist of the following elements:

Name: The name used in the editor.

Characters: The two characters involved.

Unchangeable: If set to Yes, the relationship cannot be altered during gameplay.

Personal: None, Friendly, Ally, Close Ally, Hostility, Enemy or Nemesis.

Family: None, Parent, Sibling, Cousin, Grandparent, Ancestor, Distant Relative, Clone, Alternate Version.

Romantic: None, Married, Engaged, Dating, Flirting, Divorced, Broken Up, Permanent Split.

The relationship data is used during gameplay to influence how people interact, who will be allowed to team-up together, who will target / hunt each other, etc.

Editor Tools

The standard editor suite that you may be familiar with if you've played TEW or WMMA will be available. This includes:

CBH Converter: This takes a CBH database and turns it into a CBU compatible version. The database will be playable but, as always, you will need to do some editing both to balance it to CBU's gameplay and to make use of any feature / stat that wasn't in CBH.

Mass Edit: The mass editor from TEW / WMMA is also available, allowing stats to be changed for multiple items in one go.

Importer: Allows taking items from another database and bringing them into the current one.

Balancing Count: (This was in CBH under a different name.) This gives a table that allows you to check how many heroes, villains, etc, of each popularity level are in each place. This helps balance the game world.

Data Check: An automated data checker is included, allowing you to find and fix issues quickly.


With the editor now complete, we'll move on to looking at the main gameplay experience in the next entries.

[Adam Ryland]

#9 Entering Into Combat And Puzzles

Once you're into an issue you'll have one or more encounters to tackle, with each encounter being either a type of combat or a puzzle. In today's entry we'll go through what you'll see during the pre-encounter setup phase, then we'll go through the combat and puzzle gameplay in the subsequent set of entries.

Going from the top of the screen to the bottom, you'll see:

- Where the encounter is taking place, which will either be a specific location or a site within that location. You'll be able to click this to see a detailed breakdown. This is particularly important for some combat encounters given that certain sites may be more challenging for certain characters; for example, if you have a sneaky character who relies on using the shadows, a brightly lit location that prevents shadow usage is going to make them significantly weaker in combat.

- Explanatory text. This gives you the title of the encounter and a short blurb telling the story of what's currently happening and why. For example, you may get told that a local celebrity has been kidnapped by a mystery assailant but before you can stage a rescue attempt you need to get past a small group of goons that have been hired to stall you.

- The current line-up that the heroes are fielding, plus the current total cost in terms of stars (see Rating in entry #3). You get a team made for you by default, but you're welcome to alter it. You can click any character to view their profile if you've forgotten how they function, and if you want to change your team you have access to the usual search facilities. The characters you'll have access to depends on the situation; you'll generally have all the heroic-aligned characters who are currently in the location being used, and you'll also sometimes be able to have people travel in to help out (particularly if it's to combat someone they have a negative relationship with).

- The characters that the villains are fielding plus their total cost. The villain line-up is fixed and does not alter if you choose to change your own line-up. Again, you can click a villain to load their profile if you want to explore what they can do and strategise around it.

- The encounter's limits. You may (optionally) have limits on how many characters you can field, how many your opponent can field, how many stars each team can spend in total, and / or how many stars each team can spend on any one character. By default, generally both teams will have the same limits in place, but this can be altered by previous encounters; for example, the villains may get an extra 5 stars to spend because they won the previous battle. The initial limits are calculated by the game and are done to try and keep things fair (i.e. stopping you spending a lot more than your opponent so that you have a far superior team).

- The time limit in terms of rounds. Different combat types have different limits, ranging from a short, sharp 3 round skirmish to a full-blown 25 round war. Unlimited time limits are rare but can happen.

- The stakes. This tells you what the potential bonus for winning is (if any) and what penalty you may get for losing. It also tells you how the result will affect the Balance of Power.

In the next entry we'll start looking at the combat mechanics in detail.

http://142.4.17.53/forum/images/wrespibuttons/edit.gif

[Adam Ryland]

#10 Combat (Part 1)

In this entry we'll start going through the combat system in a lot of detail.

The Opening Phase

The first thing you'll see when you enter combat is a pop-up window giving you details about the location of the fight, which is important as this will tell you which parts of the terrain are active. Depending on the location, you may also get an opening dice roll to see if an environmental factor (such as thick fog or perfect visibility) come into play.

This is then followed by a dice roll to see which side goes first and whether the villains get to launch an ambush. This dice table can be affected by the characters being used. For example, some characters are natural leaders who increase the chance of their side going first, while other characters may have 'radar sense' and make them impossible to ambush.

On-Screen Information

Once combat has actually begun you get three pieces of information at the top of the screen: the location (which can be clicked to bring back the pop-up telling you about terrain), what round it is and which side is currently on the attack, and attack / action limits. (These will be discussed in a moment.)

In the middle of the screen you will see the pictures of all the characters currently active, together with their current health level, how much remaining health they have, and their current battlefield position. You'll also see if any temporary conditions apply to them, such as being stunned.

Finally, at the bottom of the screen you will see the current status of the encounter; that is, how many rounds are left, what the 'win' condition is, and how much damage each side has done.

Attack and Action Limits

Attack and action limits are very important as they play a large part in how each team uses its members. As discussed in a previous entry, each power / ability that a character has is set to either cost an action or not. Each character on a team gets one (and only one) action to 'spend' per turn, so in a lot of cases a decision must be made as to what the best way to spend it is (for example, some characters may require you to make a choice between spending your action on launching an attack or providing defensive abilities to protect teammates from harm). However, there are also generally limits on how much the team can spend as a whole.

In the first round, both teams are always limited to using three actions in total; this balances the game and stops the team going first from blowing their opponents away with an enormous barrage.

From round two onwards, each side can spend any number of actions in total (but still only one per character), but only a limited number can be spent on attacks. The limit is the number of people on the team at the start of combat minus two, to a minimum of three; however, some useful characters (normally leader-style people) have powers that can boost this number and make their team more efficient. Again, this limit helps balance how combat plays out. Note that while the game is designed to be played with attack action limits, you can turn them off via Options if you wish.

Turn Structure

The sides take it in turn to be on the attack. When on the attack, a side can use their characters in any order and swap back and forth as often as they want; as long as the attack / action limits are obeyed, anything goes.

For example, you might have Hero 1 use an outsmarting power on Villain 1 for free to 'turn off' his defensive abilities, follow up by having Hero 2 then swoop in and spend an action to launch a melee attack on the now defenceless target, then return to Hero 1 to follow that up by spending an action to try a ranged attack. Hero 1 could then use another 'free' power to protect both himself and his partner by throwing up a barrier of some kind. Although Hero 1 has done three different things, only one cost an action and so he's within the rules.

Once a team has finished their turn, the other team goes on the attack. Once both teams have completed their turn, that's the end of the round and the process starts again.

AI Control

When the villains are on the attack, the user takes a passive role. This doesn't mean the heroes don't defend themselves, only that the user isn't required to make any decisions - as all defensive powers automatically trigger, the heroes effectively defend themselves. This makes getting through the game a lot quicker. You will see what the villains are doing via a series of pop-up screens which can be exited either by clicking or via hotkeys, again for speed.

When the heroes are on the attack, the player obviously has full control over everything. Clicking any hero will bring up their profile from where you can see all their stats and status updates, move them around the battlefield or spend hero points (both of which will be explored in more detail in the next entry), and access their power list. If you don't want to control everyone then you can give control over to the AI; it will then complete the turn as best as it can. Note that you can activate this whenever you want - if you really wanted to, you could go through combat without doing anything at all and just let the AI play for you.

Looking Ahead

I'll finish this entry here as it's already been quite long and text-heavy. In part 2 we will look at the crucial element of battlefield positions, the use of hero points, and give some illustrative examples of how characters may use their powers in a practical scenario. I'll also give some examples of how dice rolls relate to attacks for those who aren't clear on the system being used. We'll also discuss some of the strategic and tactical elements of combat, plus how some characters can generate allies, minions or sidekicks to enter the fray mid-battle.

[Adam Ryland]

#11 Combat (Part 2)

In this entry we'll be continuing directly on from part 1.

Battlefield Positions

Battlefield positions simulate where the character is in relation to everyone else and are a major part of the tactics of the game.

Once per turn each character can choose to (attempt to) move from one battlefield position to another; they can move more often, such as by having an ally with telekinesis use it on them, but it's a maximum of one intentional move per turn.

The game consists of 11 positions: In The Open, Taken Cover, In The Air, In The Shadows, Run And Cover, Aggressive Approach, Blaze Of Glory, At Range, In Ranged Cover, In Sniper's Nest, and Exposed (this final position is not one you'd ever choose, but it can be inflicted upon you by opposing effects such as getting ambushed). Note that some of these positions are not available in certain locations; for example, some indoor sites may block characters from taking to the skies.

Each position gives certain pros and cons, bar In The Open which is 'neutral'. For example, In Ranged Cover gives the character +1 to their Range Attack, +2 to Range Defence, but means they cannot make melee attacks. In The Shadows gives -1 to your Melee and Range Attack, but +1 to the respective Defence values, and being hit with a melee attack automatically knocks you to In The Open. Additionally, some powers are only effective in certain places (for example, one power allows you to potentially avoid being targeted by a range attack so long as you are in the shadows).

Related to these positions is the concept of creating and closing the distance.

If a character wants to make a melee attack against an opponent who is at range, they must first 'close the distance' by rolling a die and achieving either 4-6 (for At Range or In Ranged Cover) or 5-6 (for In Sniper's Nest). If successful then the target is moved to In The Open and the attack can happen, otherwise the attack attempt fails. Note that some powers (such as Super Speed) make it easier (or guaranteed) to close the distance and you can also turn off the entire feature via options.

If a character wants to move to range from a non-range position (and additionally they're not In The Air and there's at least one opponent near them) then they must 'create distance'. This is a die roll that needs a 3-6 to be successful. This simulates having to withdraw or retreat from the middle of the battlefield. Again, some powers make this easier or guaranteed and you can turn off the entire feature if you want.

Overall, choosing how to deploy your team across the battlefield is a key part of the game as you must take into account their strengths and weaknesses, how the battle is going, and how the opponents are currently lined-up. You might choose to go super-defensive to try and survive the last few turns, sacrificing your offensive potential to do so; you might have a couple of key characters go very offensive to try and take out the opponent's big hitter, knowing that they're going to be very vulnerable the turn after; or you might build a team that revolves around staying at range and using distance attacks, knowing that the opponents are heavily melee-oriented and will need to risk closing the distance each turn.

Hero Points

Characters can gain (and lose) a currency called 'hero points' during encounters - this is similar to XP in role-play games. A character can build up a stack of HP and then spend it during encounters to give themselves or their allies temporary benefits. Any character can gain HP as long as they're on the heroic team during an encounter.

Some examples of how you can spend it include Hold Fast (boost all your defensive skills by +2 until the start of the next turn), Motivate (heal an ally of 1 damage), Seize The Moment (give yourself 1 extra re-roll), and Inspire (boost an ally's attacking skills by +2 until the next turn).

A character gains points by being on the winning side during combat, solving a puzzle, or KOing opponents. HP is lost (in different amounts) by such things as being knocked out, getting injured, or being on the losing side.

On lower difficulty levels HP never gets lost, only gained, giving the heroes an advantage.

Generating Allies

As discussed in previous entries, each side is limited in the number of characters it can field at the start of combat; usually this will be 10, although it can be less in some situations. However, during combat each side can generate allies, minions, sidekicks etc.

To do this, an existing character must have a power that allows them to do so, and there must be at least one space on the team - a team can never have more than 10 people fighting at any one time, so if that limit has been reached then allies cannot be generated until someone is knocked out and leaves a space. Once the character activates their power and passes any requirements (such as a dice roll), the new character enters into the battle. There's no hard limit on how many people can be generated during combat, or on which characters can be brought in, that's all handled by the restrictions the database maker put on the power itself. So, it's quite possible to build 'swarm teams' that pump out a seemingly never-ending supply of low-power minions as well as 'countdown' teams where they get to generate a 'big bad' if they can build up enough power.

[Adam Ryland]

#12 Combat Examples

Continuing on from the previous two parts, here is a basic example of how a heroic turn of combat might unfold so that people can get a sense for what to expect.

Scenario: Captain Awesome and Midnight Fox are the heroic team and they're facing villains of Demento and Killowatt. The villains went first and Killowatt scored a perfect hit (a roll of 6-6) with his Forked Lightning ranged electrical attack, doing 2 damage to Cap (thanks to his Incredibly Durable power reducing the damage by 2) and a massive 4 to Fox; both are stunned as a result. The heroes are now on the attack.

Midnight Fox is stunned, down to her 'Exhausted' state with one point of health left, and is In The Shadows. Her main defensive power is Nimble, which allows her to dodge to safety, but it will not function while she is stunned - this means she's super vulnerable. As she is stunned, she cannot change position on her own, which removes the option of trying to put her in a very defensive position, so it looks like we'll have to go down swinging.

Checking her power list, we see that she has three significant attacking powers left.

First is the Fox Shock Taser which is a range electrical attack that can only be used once per issue that does 2 damage. However, Killowatt has the Master Of Electricity power that makes him immune to electrical damage, so we know this power would be useless against him. Demento would be a good target, but we note that he's currently In Ranged Cover and so gets +2 to his range defence - this would make him a 17 overall. Fox has a 9 range attack, but that would be an 8 while In The Shadows due to its -1 effect.

Second is the Fox Rocker EMP Grenade, a shockwave electrical attack that is currently unusable as both opponents are behind cover and so not valid targets. As Killowatt would be immune anyway, this attack is not going to be a good choice anyway.

Third are Martial Arts Strikes, a melee physical attack that deals 2 points of Physical damage to 1 target. Checking, we see that Fox's melee attack is currently 9 compared to Demento's melee defence of 16 and Killowatt's 19. As we'd have to close the distance before making the attack, our In The Shadows position isn't an issue as we'd automatically end up In The Open.

We decide to be bold anyway and go after Demento with a melee attack, hoping that is might soften him up for Cap. We choose Martial Arts Strikes and select Demento as the target. The targeting screen confirms that we'll need to first close the distance (a 4-6 die roll) and also that Demento has a power, Hidden Influence, that will allow him to avoid the attack on a roll of 3-6 because he's behind cover. If we manage to get the attack off, we're rolling on an 9 melee attack vs a melee defence of 16, so we'd need an 8 or above off two dice...not great, but not awful.

We launch the attack.

We roll a die to see if we close the distance and get a 5, which is a success. Both Fox and Demento are now In The Open. Even if this attack fails, at least Demento is going to be an easier target for Cap now.

We roll two dice to see if the attack hits and roll a 2 and a 5...which is a miss, as we needed 8 or above. As this is the first round we can't even use a re-roll to try and get a better result. Demento doesn't even need to roll to see if he avoids the attack, so that's all Fox can do for this turn. It's likely she'll be knocked out next turn, but there's nothing further we can do about that.

Turning to Captain Awesome, we find that he's currently In The Open and is stunned. Although he has taken 2 damage, he's still on the first of his three health levels.

Looking at his power list, we see that he has Trained Detective that would allow him to outsmart one of an opponent's powers, but it's unavailable when stunned. That would have been useful. However, he does have two other great powers. The first is Ka-Bam!, which is a melee physical attack and deals a whopping 5 points of damage to 1 target. This won't KO Demento, but it will severely hurt him. We also have Smack! Thwock! Bam! which is a melee attack that does 3 points of physical damage to up to 3 targets. Both these attacks would stun a hit villain. We now have an interesting dilemma - is it better to try and hit both villains for 3 in the hope that it'll weaken their attacking potential slightly (maybe even to the point of allowing Midnight Fox to survive one more turn), or blast Demento so that next turn he'll be vulnerable to a knock out but leave Killowatt at his full power level and therefore most destructive?

We decide to go with attacking both and so choose Smack! Thwock! Bam! The targeting screen informs us that Killowatt will get +2 to his defending score because he has Taken Cover (Demento gets no bonuses because Fox already pulled him out into the open) and will modify damage -1 because of his Mutant Durability power, but otherwise neither villain has any power to try and avoid or dodge the attack. Overall, we need to roll 4+ to hit Demento (13 attack vs 16 defence) and 9+ to hit Killowatt (13 on 21).

We roll two dice and get a 5 and a 6 for a total of 9! Demento is stunned and takes 3 points of physical damage. Killowatt is also stunned and takes 2 points of damage (thanks to his -1 reducer), plus he automatically gets brought to In The Open because he got hit with a melee attack. The game informs us that Demento is now on his second health level and has 4 points of damage remaining, while Killowatt is also on his second health level ('Staggered') and has 8 points remaining.

With both heroes having used up their actions for the turn and not having any free action powers in their arsenal, that ends the heroic turn. It's not looking great for the heroes given Fox's condition, but Cap's powerful punches have stunned and weakened both villains and so means that there's still a fighting chance...

[Adam Ryland]

#13 Progress Update

This is just going to be a short entry to keep everyone up to date on the game's progress.

You may remember that the original estimate was that we'd be looking to release in the late summer. That might still happen, but I suspect we're probably looking more at a September / October release.

The coding itself is pretty much finished (I'd say we're upward of 95% done) and the game is fully playable as I write this. The default database is also almost complete. Where we're slightly behind schedule is the interface graphics, as most of the game doesn't yet have proper graphics attached. Fortunately this isn't a particularly difficult part of the process, but it does mean that the release date will depend on them getting done.

On the plus side, the later the release date, the more testing we can do and also the more extra powers, schemes, etc, can be added. There's also some minor features that I didn't think that I'd have time to put in that may now have a chance of appearing.

So, overall, we're definitely on schedule for a release within a few months from now but I can't give a definitive date yet. There'll be further updates as we get closer and closer to release.

[Adam Ryland]

#14 Puzzles

The other major type of encounters are puzzles. In most issues, combat and puzzles will be intermingled, although you'll rarely do more than one puzzle per encounter. Most of the time puzzles will represent the heroes trying to unravel a plot or locate a villain, and whether the succeed or not will impact the combat that follows (such as guaranteeing that one side gets to attack first, giving boosts to the winning side's attack values, or penalising the losers' defence values).

As puzzles are a little more conceptual than combat and some people may not like that, users have the option of turning puzzles off entirely via the options menu.

Basic Concept

Puzzles always feature two sides: the heroic side, controlled by the player, which has between 1 and 3 heroes, and the villainous side which consists of a single villain, the puzzle-setter. (As with combat, there may be restrictions on how many stars you can spend on your team.) These encounters represent a puzzle, problem or mystery that the villain has created to befuddle or stall the heroes and their attempts to come up with a solution.

This concept is represented on-screen by a progress bar that goes from Stumped at one end to Solved at the other. Instead of doing damage to each other, the two sides try to score points to move that bar further toward their goal; if the bar reaches one extreme or the other, the puzzle ends, whereas if it reaches its time limit then the side that are closest to their goal win.

Types

Puzzles are always either Wits, Mystical or Technological. All three work in the same way, the difference is in which stats the characters use for their attack and defence values.

What Characters Can Do

During a puzzle, each character can do several things.

Both heroes and the villain can use any of their appropriate powers (using the same system of actions and non-actions as described in the combat section). Obviously some powers, such as attacks, are combat-specific and aren't usable during puzzles, but many others - such as trying to outsmart powers or boost stats - are available. There are many puzzle-exclusive powers in the game.

Each side can also attempt a solution (heroes) or a deception (villain). There are at least three versions of each (such as Leap Of Faith or Desperation Ploy), each coming with different pros and cons such as how much of a risk it involves and how big of a movement it will trigger in the progress bar. Attempting a solution or deception costs an action, just like powers. They all work in the same manner as a combat attack, with the user's attack value (modified by any additional powers or effects) going against the villain's defence value via a roll of the dice.

For heroes only, they also have the option of following a lead. This costs an action and triggers an die roll to see if they're successful, but can result in them gaining 1 lead. Once a hero has at least 1 lead, they can spend an action to follow it; this triggers a die roll to see what the result is, with several bonus, neutral or negative effects possible. Using leads is often a good insurance policy, or a fine tactic if one or more of the team are too weak to directly try a solution or deception.

Power Play

Much like combat has attack and action limits, the first two rounds of a puzzle have a 'power play' status. This disables some solutions / deception options and reduces negative impact of failures, meaning that both sides can be a little more aggressive early on.

Hero Points

As with combat, the heroic side can spend their HP to trigger certain temporary boosts to help them try and defeat the villain.

AI Assistance

As with combat, the player can choose to give some or all of his or her turn to the AI to complete. There is also a Surrender button if you get behind and don't think you can make a comeback; as you'd expect, this gives the villain the win automatically.

[Adam Ryland]

#15 Factions

In this entry we'll be looking at how factions work; those who have played CBH will be familiar with most of this as they function in a very similar fashion. As with previous entries, we'll be looking at them via the prism of the editor and what you see when you are creating or modifying a faction. NB The terms 'faction' and 'team' are used interchangeably.

Basic Settings

Names: As with characters, you have Editor, Official and Game names to allow variations on a team.

Picture: The faction's logo.

Description: A short biography for flavour.

Active: Yes or No; whether the faction is currently active in the game world.

Popularity: This works the same as for characters, and is used to decide how teams will interact with other teams and characters.

Team Type: The options are; Family (the most stable type), League of Allies (rarely change their core membership), Loose Alliance (regularly change their line-up), Cult (only the leader(s) really matter), Occasional Team-Up (get involved in fights less regularly), Shadow Group (rarely if ever get involved in fights and tend to have a stable line-up), and Junior Team (younger characters tend not to get stuck with junior roles like they would in other groups).

Alignment: Hero, Villain, Anti-Hero or Wildcard. This reflects how it interacts with the game world.

Allow Additions / Removals: Yes or No, used for controlling membership.

Requires Leadership: Yes or No, sets whether the faction cannot function without at least one member holding a Leader role.

Key Members: No Requirement, Requires Minimum One or Requires All. This sets the need (or lack of) for the various key members to be active within the faction.

Travel Together: No, Yes (Exclude Juniors), Yes (Include Juniors). This controls whether the team will move as a single unit during the travel part of the game.

Limit Scope To (Location, Area, Timeframe and / or Dimension): This allows the faction to be limited to certain places, stopping them from dealing with other factions or characters from outside that sphere of influence.

Membership Settings

Faction Membership Criteria: This is a list of pre-set rules that control the addition of new members. There is no limit to how many or how few can be assigned. These include things like Cannot Be Child, Maximum Membership Number, Minimum Popularity, and Requires Specific Power.

Members: An unlimited number of members can be added using the following settings; Role (Leader, Senior Member, Regular Member, Junior Member, Part-Time Member, Honourary Member, Reserve Member, Major Past Member, Minor Past Member, Key Member (Yes or No), Can Leave (Yes or No), and Valid Alignments (Yes or No for Hero, Villain, Anti-Hero, Wildcard and Civilian).

As you can see, you don't need to just set currently active members, you can put past members too; the various roles inform the game how to handle those people (for example, a Reserve Member is very likely to be 'called up' if and when the faction needs to bolster its membership).

It's important to note that a member is only considered an active part of the faction if they have a non-passive status (like Active or Recovering), an active role (i.e. not Past Member), and a valid alignment. If they fail on any count, they are not considered currently part of the team for things like counting members and being eligible to take part in faction fights. This is crucial to understand as it means that you can (and in some cases it will be necessary to) have multiple versions of the same character all with membership entries. For example, if you have three versions of Hero X, each being the same person with just a costume change but only one being currently in the game world, you can assign all three to Faction X knowing that, by definition, only the currently active version of that character will be considered part of the faction...but if and when they change costume, they won't lose their place in the team. (Of course, the previously covered Character Linkers can be used to automatically link together multiple character entries to the same faction, so you don't always need to make each membership entry manually).

This concludes the faction section. In the next entry we'll be looking at the remaining major screens that haven't been covered yet. There'll also be another progress report coming soon.

[Adam Ryland]

#16 The Remaining Major Screens (Part 1); Game Stats And Past Issues

In this two-part entry we'll go through the remaining big screens that haven't been covered yet.

Game Stats

Available from the main menu is the game stats screen. This isn't part of the game world itself, instead it's a screen that gives you a detailed breakdown of what has happened in this save game. Those who aren't interested in stats can, of course, ignore it, but it's a nice little extra for people who do like to see all the numbers.

The screen is effectively split into two. At the top you have the 'overall' stats, such as your current win / loss / draw figures and percentages, then stats on how you've done in the various types of encounters (such as how many times you've won a regular combat encounter by total knock out of the opposition, etc).

This top half of the screen also gives you access to your Rogues Gallery screen, which is a top 10 of the villains who have given you (the user, rather than a specific character) the most trouble in terms of inflicting defeats on you. Again, this doesn't have any impact on the gameplay, it's just a nice extra.

The bottom half of the screen consists of a space for top 15s and drop-down menus that allow you to choose and filter various categories. For example, you can look for the character with the highest overall combat win ratio and choose to limit it to only people who have been in at least 5 encounters, or the people who have achieved the most knock outs, or find out which characters have the worst record when it comes to losing puzzles while on the heroic side. There's a lot of different categories, so if you like stats you should enjoy poking around in this section.

Past Issues

As you'd expect, there's a whole section where you can review what happened in previous issues. If an issue consisted of multiple encounters you'll be able to see an entry for each, meaning that you can always find information on any battle or puzzle that you've been a part of. You'll get plenty of info here, including who was on each side, how they did, and what the final result was.

In part 2, coming shortly, we'll look at the Options screen and cover in detail every aspect that you can control.

[Adam Ryland]

#17 The Remaining Major Screens (Part 2); Options

As is a hallmark of my games, you'll have access to a large number of options that allow you to tailor the gameplay experience to your preferences. We'll begin by looking at the settings options, then give an overview of the various sub-screens that you can get to from the Options menu. Note that many of the current settings can also be changed mid-encounter (i.e. during combat or puzzles) so you aren't limited to waiting for the end of the issue to make switches.

Current Settings

Auto Save

Difficulty Level: You can change to any of the four difficulty levels whenever you like.

Publisher: You're unlikely to want to change the publisher name, as this would generally be set at the database level by the mod maker, but the option is available in case you spot an annoying typo.

Use Large Pictures: The game is designed to be played with large body pictures, but if you don't have access to those sort of images you can switch to just using smaller face images.

Puzzles: As discussed earlier, you can turn puzzle encounters off entirely if you don't enjoy them.

Universe Speed: This governs how quickly characters will return from injury or absence; the higher the speed, the less issues need to pass for people to come back.

Deaths: This sets whether deaths are permanent or not.

Balance of Power Speed: This adjusts how many points will be on offer for each issue. The higher the rate, the more volatile (and potentially quicker) the game will be.

Balance of Power Style: This is a stylistic option that changes how the BoP is displayed on the homepage. It's entirely cosmetic.

'Meanwhile' Events: If active, 'meanwhile in <publisher name> comics' events will happen after each issue. These are functionally identical to the Game Universe Progression content type (except that special 'Costume Change' identity switch triggers are eligible) in that they allow characters and factions to evolve. Having this active therefore makes the game world a bit more alive and allows change to happen more rapidly.

Dialogue: This sets whether character dialogue is enabled or disabled.

Hero Point Messages: This sets whether the user receives updates on a character's HP whenever it changes, as some people might find it distracting to get messages during encounters. (It doesn't change whether HP changes, only whether you explicitly get written updates on it.)

Streamline Encounters: If enabled, the game will 'streamline' combat and puzzle encounters by not showing pop-up messages that are deemed skippable, such as those that deal entirely in calculations or confirmations that the user has no way of interacting with. This reduces the total number of pop-ups, making for a much quicker game experience and less clicking, at the expense of losing a degree of detail. Note that everything still happens in exactly the same way, and you can review anything that happened in detail via the in-game log, you're just not seeing explicit on-screen messages about it.

Relationship Changes: The user can disable relationships, in which case they don't form or evolve at all.

Usage Restrictions: This feature was covered earlier in the journal; this allows the user to disable the feature if they want.

Power Descriptions: Purely cosmetic, the user can turn off the short descriptions of what a power does if they want. If so, when a character chooses to use that power the resulting pop-up leaves off that information.

Dice Roll Reveal: This sets how dice rolls are displayed; this can be Instant (they're shown immediately), Single Click (they are shown as '?' to begin with and a single mouse click will then 'roll' them to show the result), or Individual Click (the same as Single Click except that it's one click per die).

Environmental Rolls: This disables environmental rolls entirely if the user doesn't like them.

Attack Hit Requirements: This sets whether to hit an attack requires you to equal the defender's score or beat it. Obviously, only needing to equal the score means that attacks are easier to land and combat will tend to be shorter and more brutal; needing to beat the score makes for a slightly more strategic game where the defending team always have a slight advantage.

First Round Re-Rolls: If turned off, which is recommended, neither side can use re-rolls during the first round of combat. This helps prevent the side that rolls to go first getting too much of an early advantage.

Attack Action Limits: Action limits were discussed in depth in the combat entry of this journal, this option simply allows the feature to be disabled.

AI Positioning: This setting is for when the AI has been handed control of the hero team, and sets how much control it has over being able to move characters around; it can either be Always Allow, Always Deny, or Ask Me (in which case the player needs to OK any request to move).

Creating / Closing Distance: The use of distance in combat was covered in an earlier entry; these two options allow the user to enable or disable whether these aspects of the feature are in effect.

Backfire Damage: The game is designed with the intent that rolling a Backfire (1-1) results in that character taking one point of damage. You can, however, turn that feature off if you want.

Stun Blocks Movement: It is intended that a stunned character cannot choose to move to a new battlefield position of his own accord, but this option allows you to turn that restriction off.

Relationship Targeting: If turned on, the AI will take into account relationships when calculating who a character will target with attacks, being more likely to go after known enemies. This makes the game more realistic to comics, albeit at the expense of the AI not playing 'perfectly'.

Force Character Moves: This controls to what degree the user can force characters to travel around the game world between issues. The game is intended to be played with the user not interfering with this and allow the characters to move of their own accord, but some players may prefer to be able to move heroes (or villains) to new locations manually for storyline or gameplay purposes. The setting of this option allows you to specific who you're allowed to move (for example, you may limited yourself to heroes only).

Encounter Lock: This setting allows you to specify that all issues going forward must take place either in a specific Location or a specific Area, Timeframe or Dimension. By default there is no encounter lock in place, but it may be useful to some users to force the content to be in a certain place for storyline or gameplay reasons. The lock stays in place until the user chooses to change or disable it.

[Adam Ryland]

#18 Progress Update

This, again, will just be a quick post to keep everyone up-to-date.

In terms of the game's status, CBU is pretty much complete at this point. Other than a handful of screens that need their interface graphics completed, all coding, database work, and the majority of the testing has been completed. I'll be spending the rest of the time until release doing some in-depth play-testing to find any hard-to-find bugs and tweak the gameplay where needed. You'll notice from the past couple of journal entries that there's already been some new additions (particularly the 'streamline' option) that have been brought in to address feedback from the testing team.

As a side note, because a few people asked, I can confirm that I've downloaded and tried all the existing mods from CBH and have made sure that they all convert to CBU without issue (although, again, they will need some editing to make use of the features in CBU that have no equivalent in the older game).

With regards to a release date, I think mid-October looks the most likely time. This will allow the final graphics to arrive and for Grey Dog to set everything up at their end too. I'd therefore expect to be able to give you all an exact release date pretty soon, hopefully before September is through, together with info on things like price, a public beta period, etc.

[Adam Ryland]

#19 Non-Update Update

Just a quick update, or rather non-update, to start October.

In the previous entry I noted that the game was finished, all that I was waiting on was the final few graphics to complete the interface and then the game could be released; unfortunately there's been a delay at the artist's end, so there's been no progress on that front. I'm hopeful that I might get them this week. We definitely won't be releasing before the 10th, as Arlie (Grey Dog CEO) is away until then, but I'd expect the game to be in your hands shortly after that. So, nearly there!

In the meantime I've been adding in a few extra powers and small features and the game has been undergoing play-testing.

One thing I can confirm is that we'll be doing our usual one-week 'public beta' period when the game comes out. For those not familiar with this, it means we release an open beta that anyone can play and report issues that they encounter or suggestions for changes / additions; that way I can address any issues before we ask people to pay and you get the opportunity to try before you buy. Speaking of which, we will be announcing the price of the game when Arlie gets back.

Hopefully the next entry will be to give you a definitive release date and complete the journal.

[Adam Ryland]

#20 Release Details

I'm pleased to be able to announce that the game is now completely finished and has an official release date.

The public beta of CBU will launch on Saturday 22nd October. You'll see the release announcement and download link here on the forums and on the main GDS website.

The full retail version of the game will then launch one week later on Saturday 29th October. The game will be priced at $24.95.

Note that we won't be giving an extra time for either release, but it will likely be in the late afternoon, GMT, on both occasions.

To answer some common questions in advance: you will be able to both use and work on mods with the public beta; you will have access to all features - the only restriction will be on how many issues you can play through per save game; and the CBU sub-forums will be opening at the same time as the public beta launches.

If anyone has any other questions, please use the discussion thread.