Now before you guys start raging on me, I know its next to impossible to have this be a thing, especially since we lack resources, a massive playerbase etc. Just an idea that struck me, if in an alternate reality where pox was as big as Warcraft, imagine what itd be like if it later spawned an RPG spinoff. You could be protectorate or wrath, pick your faction, then pick your race and then your class. Race would mainly be for aesthetic purposes, although you would get a racial ability. Class ofcourse would be the basis of your stats and abilities, some classes could be restricted to your faction/race. Maljaran races could serve as an expansion, adding the new races and a few new classes as well. Any thoughts?
I had a thought of a spin off game as well, but didn't consider an RPG. I was thinking more a Tower Defense style game, salvage the sprites already in game through them on a grid and play it like kingdom rush where melee units rally around a flag and ranged units shoot from afar. Comparing a Pox RPG to World of Warcraft seems like the wrong direction for a Pox RPG. Making it into an MMO just seems like too much of a daunting task to even fathom before testing the waters for it's potential success with a smaller endeavor. I propose making a Realms of Everquest style game rather than Everquest. Having a scripted RPG using the Heroes as player characters would lend itself to make developing it easier and even in that limit it to the Heroes that can fill an archetype and don't have to factor in potential issues with size or special abilities such as 2x2 units or flying units. Wrath: Warrior - Dirge (avoids possible size issues associated with Klub and the need to add flying mechanics that Sciean would require) Mage - Grimlic Cleric - Xulos Sundered Lands poses a problem IMO Protectorate: Warrior - Talgar Mage - Menalaus Cleric - Gekaal Ranger - Azaren (typical pet archetype with range support) Dividing it into archetypes and limiting it to pre-made characters gives you an in for the story rather than having to make it open for each race to make 'sense', it also gives you the option to give the characters personalities and possibly even voice acting to make it more story driven than having to resort to the typical silent protagonist or stock lines that all characters sort of share. Being hero type characters also allows for limited tactical play too since they would have some station amongst their faction. Pox is a strategy game having some control over an 'army' would make sense to add in, think Dynasty Warriors. You play as an officer which can be thought of as your hero, and then you get a fodder army, this would allow for other npc characters like Korona, Sixul, Snogvie etc to make appearances as sub-bosses without needing to put full thought into them as if they were player character. Pox doesn't really lend itself to the traditional kill and loot RPG so a Dynasty Warriors style where you can get some of the faction's equipment runes for 'gear' makes more sense so you don't have to worry too terribly much about a developed loot system generating random gear with improved stats and such. Each 'officer' could be in possession of a stolen relic that serves as your equippable items and then for balance sake it's always the same item and each character gets one so there is a 'lucky' party member that gets their equipment and the other too are just out of luck. (Before anybody comments about Dynasty Warrior's gameplay I'm using it's style of game as a model the gameplay, the actual behavior of the player characters could be edited to more traditional RPG schemes where enemy 'lesser' units are sort of section bosses and the enemy Heroes are more final boss material.) Divide the campaign and keep it simple to Wrath vs Protectorate. Keep pvp out of it for the trial run for simplicity's sake so you have less to worry about when it comes to balance of the characters in comparison against each other and just have to worry about the balance of the player characters as they relate to each other so you see some diversity in characters used. Limit the game to 1-4 players so in theory you could have each playable character on the field at the same time to form a diverse party. Then let the actual player character act like a Diablo character (since you used Blizzard's World of Warcraft) and let the levels run like a Dynasty Warriors map with the exception that you get to direct your soldiers based on your 'officers'. Your officers would be chosen at the deployment screen and they and their units would have strengths, weaknesses, and a number of mob style units under their command. These officers could then have mechanics where the units under their command die and need to not be deployed to replenish the numbers or where the surviving members get tired from being over deployed so you have to vary your 'team' from deployment to deployment. The tactical would of course be controlled by the host of the game as the game would be considered 'their' world, clients could import their playable characters (levels, skills, stats, etc).
You implied that being of a certain race would get you its racial ability, therefore it can not be a Pox based game.
That actually sounds viable, if we could somehow get a kickstarter project going for it with the devs behind the idea it might be able to draw in people. Also for SL i was thinking Torien would fit in as more of an archer than a ranger, would help give differentiate the factions a bit.
I thought about Sunder Lands using a non-hero, but then it begs the question why Sundered Lands has a non-hero playable character that's why I said it was a problem. The Basilisk Templar was my first thought, where Azaren would have ranged abilities the Templar could still have his 'pet' in his basilisk mount, but then be more of a melee base character. While I'm all for a larger range of diversity I think for the initial foray things should be kept close and give them only minor uniqueness between their counterpart in Wrath or Protectorate. If you can save coding time and hours by cutting corners by making Grimlic and Menalaus close with just a unique ability here and there, but basically the same then that makes it more likely that there would actually be a product. If the product then proves successful you can diversify further and develop it more for the next installment. It's like why bake bread from scratch when you're making a lunch-meat sandwich before dinner as a snack when Wonder Bread gets you that sandwich now where baking that bread you might as well wait for dinner and you end up hungry and possibly without a sandwich at all since it gets pushed out by dinner. What's more important getting the snack at all or risking not getting a snack trying to make it the greatest snack you've ever had? Sometimes you need to cut a few corners to get something to serve your purpose otherwise you might end up having to do without. I think even a basic rpg could get 10-20 per download and possibly let Pox branch out to the consoles and turn Pox RPG into a series that would be more profitable than an attempt at a Pox MMO with micro transactions. If they got it on the Xbox they could sell avatar props or they could sell the skins Like Xmas Grimlic for use in the RPG. Slightly off-topic, but going back to Pox branching to other genres I'd buy a Pox themed Fire Emblem game. Using the Serkan arc as the basis for the story since the factions sort of united against him temporarily would allow you to recruit favorite characters from each faction, they could simply write in a 'player character' whose goal is to unit the factions against the threat of the Utterdark to use as your starting units for the campaign. Once you get a few scripted joins that are easy like starting in Ironfist where they're already anti-evil and what not you could then turn it into the more traditional joining methods where X character has to talk to Y to convince them to join or making sure they make it through the stage alive triggers a scene where they eventually agree to join your cause. The fact that Serkan manipulated all the factions against themselves would let you fight all types and make sense of why Talgar is fighting Euan or something or another.
You could make a tabletop game(pen,paper and dice with some rules) based on poxnora.A lot of interesting settings and worlds have tabletop versions made by amateurs and fans.Like Elder Scrolls for example.
