Amiga Times

home *** CD-ROM | disk | FTP | other *** search

/ Amiga Times / AmigaTimes.iso / demos / spiele / FoundationDemo / FoundationManual.txt < prev next >

Wrap

Text File | 1998-10-06 | 34.4 KB | 779 lines

-------------------------------------------------------------------------- Foundation Manual (in progress version) -------------------------------------------------------------------------- ************************************************************************** This document will eventually grow into the final Foundation Manual. At the moment it will contain only a brief description of the games features and has been released to help those who are playing the demos. ************************************************************************** There are still many important missing features in this file but it should at least help you with some basic information. ************************************************************************** Contents 1. System Requirements. 2. Installation. 3. Game Description. 4. Resources Description. 5. Unit Descriptions. 6. Building Descriptions. 7. General Game Play. 8. The Control Panels. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1. System Requirements. Foundation requires a 2Meg AGA equipped Amiga (e.g.. A1200) The game has been aimed towards a 68030 based Amiga as minimum but a bare A1200 is enough to run the game at an acceptable speed. The RTG version will need a CyberGFX/P96 supported graphics card and at least 6Meg of memory. The graphics car will also have to deal with quite a large amount of inboard data so 4Meg Video ram is recommended for hires screens. It is recommended that an 040/40 is a good standard for the RTG version. Extra memory is also helpful as it reduces the amount of disk access during the game. Users with only 2Meg of memory will find the game will access the disk very frequently. While the game does use it's own cache system it is recommended that you use a dedicated cache program for better support and flexibility not to mention speed. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2. Installation The game will run from any location on a Hard Drive and there is no need for any special setups (e.g.. assigns, paths etc..) There is no point in discussing the instillation of the demo at this stage because there will be many demo updates. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- 3. Game description. Story ----- (The storyline is not yet included) The general story of the game is based on a fantasy world where people from all times in history have been gathered up by an unknown force to experience the aspects of life they enjoyed most or parts of life they wish they had been able to play while they were alive. An example of this is Albert Einstein who was tired of knowing how the universe worked so he wanted nothing more than to play about with magic and wizardry. For some reason the world of Foundation is full of Amiga users who seem to be just so keen to play out their fantasies that they have always dreamed of. (the full story will be continued....) Basic Gameplay ideas. Take control over your people. Explore the land and build the necessary buildings to provide extra food and resources. Complete the mission which may involve destroying the other teams or any number of set missions including take control over 80% of the land and so on. The Main Screen. ---------------- The main screen is split into 5 main sections:- ,----,---------- b -------, | a |--------------------| |----| | | | | | e | c | |----| | | | | | |--------------------| '----'-----------d--------' a> The Small Map. This shows the current view position on the Map and provides a way to quickly move your view. It also shows you the areas that have been explored. Clicking the small map with the right button will bring up the large Map Window. The buttons on the side of the small map are as follows:- Game Speed This allows you to switch from normal/fast Game speed. Read Messages. This icon will flash when you have any messages. Building Spaces This will show you all the available "plots" for building. Statistics. This is a quick was to access the Statistics panel. Ideas. This icon will flash when you have any new ideas. b> The Status Panel. This shows the date and current Technology level for your people. It is also used as an area to type messages. Using the 'Enter' key you can go into the Message mode which is most useful in multiplayer network mode. It also provides a traditional means of entering Cheats but that sort of thing would never be dreamt of in this game... c> The View area. This is where all the action can be viewed. It is here where you can point and select your people/buildings. This view is used for almost all of your game control. You can resize the Game View using the F1-F2 keys. Making the view size smaller will speed up the game on slower machines. d> The Resources Panel. Here you can keep watch on some of your resources. Using the slider arrows you can cycle through and gain an instant information on any of your resources. The figure shown is the amount of resources/people you have in your Headquarters and your Warehouses. You may have more resources in your other buildings but this value shows the amount of spare/unused elements you have. e> The Control Panel. This panel is where all the statistics and game control can be accessed. If you have selected a building or any of your people, you can then issue orders or alter the settings for you buildings. From the icon panels you can also set up your trading and many other game controls. The Control panel together with the View Area is where the whole game is controlled. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- 4. Resources Descriptions. Resources are split into 2 main groups. 1> Materials. 2> Food. Here is a full description of the materials group. Gold. Used as a basic currency for buying and selling goods. It is also used in the training of soldiers, Wizards and Scientists. Another use for gold is in the payment of repairs to your buildings. It is good to keep a good supply of gold for any emergencies. Wood and Stone. Two of the most basic building materials. The Stone can be mined or you could also use your Stone Mason to recover Stone from around the land. The wood is taken from the forestry and so it is good to keep your Foresters active at all times. Coal. Used in the refinery to create Gold and Steel. Also used in the process of making armour. Steel. Used to create Armour and sometimes as a building material. Ore. The Ore is broken down in the refinery to form Gold and Steel. Water. A very important resource. Used for refreshing your people in it's basic form and used in the Brewery to create Wine. The water is also used by some buildings as part of production. Oil. Used in the Laboratory as a part of experiments and it is also used by the Peasants to set fire to buildings. Without this element you will not be able to develop new technologies and the torch building command will not be available. Armour. Sometimes used in the Building process to create strong forts. It is also used in the process of training Soldiers and upgrading your troops. Magic. Used by the Wizards to create buildings, trees and other Wizard type activities. Without Magic the world of Foundation will come out of your control and you will become defenceless to attacks such as fire. Ideas. The Idea element is really just a Blue Print or scroll containing the new ideas from the scientists. As soon as the Idea arrives in Storage, it can be used to upgrade your technology in the form of a new building or upgrades. Cross The Cross is the symbol of the Soul. When a member of your team dies the Cross will appear as the last remains. And the foods group... Bread, Meat, Wheat, Wine, Vegetables, Fruit, Fish All foods work in the same way but certain activities require different groups of food. The soldiers working in the forts will enjoy eating Bread and Wine while the scientists like to eat Fish and Vegetables while they are working. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- 5. Unit Descriptions. People/Units are split into two groups. 1> Working Units. 2> Fighting Units. First to explain the working Units. The Peasant. This is your most important Unit. The Peasant can be used for many tasks such as mining, fishing and farming. They are used to transport resources about your land. The Peasant can take on most jobs in your kingdom and once trained they can be upgraded to become higher level Units. The Maiden. Another important Unit. Without the Maiden your people cannot reproduce and your numbers will soon shrink. The Maiden provides you with fresh blood and a good supply of Maidens is needed in order for you to generate a large healthy band of people. For your people to breed and reproduce you will need to give them some privacy. The Headquarters is not the best place to raise a family but it is possible. The newborn people in the world of Foundation have the ability to work in the same way as the older people. While the soul of the character is 1 year old he will still have the ability to work in the same way as older characters. In the world of Foundation you take on the character rather than the character taking on you. The Wizard. The Wizards are highly trained in the use of Magic. For many years they have replaced the Peasants skills in the area of Building and transforming the land. With a good supply of magic they can provide you with all the buildings you require. You will still need to provide the necessary resources for building but the use of Magic has speeded up the process of building and indeed the removal of buildings. The Wizards jobs have become more difficult in time and they are starting to become lost with the traditional roles of Wizardry. Maybe this is why many Wizards are turning to the more exciting activities of war. The Scientist. Without science you cannot expand your technologies and your enemies will soon surpass your knowledge. With a good team of scientists you can create a good flow of fresh ideas that will keep you ahead of your opposition. The Scientists can also give you some much needed advice on how to improve your status and provide important upgrades to your buildings. Scientists are also the key to discovering cures to any health problems that can arise with overcrowding and the problems of war. The Soldier/Guard. Every building in your land will have room for at least one Guard. If you have a guard in a building it will protect you from internal attacks. When the guard has served enough time and he has proved himself in his work he will be promoted to a Knight. The Knight The knight is a powerful fighter. He is strong and brave but he is not happy to be reduced to the lower ranks of a Guard. He will happily serve to your demands on the battlefield an after he has reached a high level of experience he will be promoted to Black Knight. The Black Knight The strongest of all fighting units. He will usually survive until his days are over and he has the power to protect himself from most attackers. He is immune to the arrows of the archer and it is rare for a Peasant to be brave enough to approach him. The Archer The archers are known to be cowardly people. They like to keep away from any trouble but if you give them enough distance they can usually take out targets quickly and safely. Being a cowardly group they enjoy nothing more than to live in the safety of the Archers Tower where they are safe from even the weakest of peasant attackers. Their biggest fear is the power of the Black Knights who enjoy using their immunity of arrows to scare the life out of the Archers. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- 6. Building Descriptions. Headquarters. The Headquarters is used as storage for resources and people. It is also the home of your good self so it is important that you protect it against the enemy. Storage space is limited so you will probably need to build at least one Warehouse to store a large bulk of your goods. If this building is lost then the game is over. Mines. Important building for the collection of Stone, Ore, Coal and Oil. Farmhouse. Important building for the creation of Wheat, Fruit and Vegetables. Warehouse. This is a very important building. Without the Warehouse you may find that resources and people are delayed in the process of leaving your Headquarters. Does the modern day problem of Bandwidth sound familiar? Don't underestimate the usefulness of this Building. Armoury. The place where your Steel is turned into Armour which is the important resource of War. Pump House. The all important Water source. Without water you can expect to see many health problems. Wizard Hut. While this was initially a place for Wizards to keep themselves to themselves, this building has become a good place for Wizards to train for higher levels. Peasant Hut. A nice peaceful building which gives the Maidens the privacy they need and it also stops the Headquarters from becoming too overcrowded. Forester. The source of your wood collection. Your forester will happily collect up the wood from the surrounding trees. As the wood is collected it is also distributed about the local buildings. Stone Mason. The Stone mason will search the land for rocks. This is probably the best source of stone you will have. Refinery. This is yet another all important building where your Ore is refined to become Gold and Steel. Fishery. Most of the time you will have plenty of water to allow you to fish for this vital food item. The Fishery must be built close to the sea or lakes. The Fishermen are often too lazy to leave their warm hut but when the sun comes out you can sometimes see them lining up and going about their business. Crematorium. This is where the last remains of your people (the cross) can be refined to become a single element of Magic. The magic is then used to aid you in your future developments. Laboratory. The important base for advancing technology. This is where your Scientist will be housed and provided with the resources to develop new technologies and any other helpful advances to aid you on your mission. Bakery. This is where the Bread is formed from the Wheat and Water. While it is possible to live without the Bread it is worth providing it to improve the diet of your people. Brewery. The Wine is not the most healthy food source but it helps to keep your people happy. Using the Brewery you can provide this popular beverage. It is possible to live without this Food type but if your Population get unhappy you may be forced to provide them with this building. Keep a close watch on the morale of your people. Food Factory. Modern day living has inspired the use of a simple one building for everything approach to creating food. This is the easiest way to provide a good range of food but it is also the most expensive method so keep a watch on your Gold supplies. Barracks. The important place to train your people. You can train your Peasants in here to become soldiers. That will cost you one Gold and one Armour. You can also train Scientists and Wizards who each cost one Gold to train. Hospital The Hospital works in a similar way to the Warehouse. It acts as a storage of people and food. There are some important differences. First of all the food combined with the healthy living will allow your people to recover quickly. If you have many Peasants in the Hospital and you request for a Peasant to leave the building then the most healthy Peasant will leave first. Any time during the game you find a sick person you should always send him/her to the Hospital to recover. If the building becomes overcrowded then some healthy people will leave to make room for the sick. (many more buildings to be added) -------------------------------------------------------------------------- 7. General Game Play Summon your people. The first task you must learn is that of commanding your people to leave a building. This is done in two main ways. The easiest method is using the Quick Orders panel. You can call up this panel by clicking in an empty space in the play area. The Quick Orders panel will show you how many spare people you have in your Warehouse or Headquarters. Selecting one of these people will command that character to leave his home and walk to your chosen location. See the detailed description of the Quick Orders panel for more information. Another way to command a person to leave a building is via the Occupants panel. You can call this panel up by selecting the same building twice. There is also an Occupants button in most building panels. The Occupants panel will provide you with a simple list of the people in the current building and it is possible to select any one of these and command him to leave using the leave building button. See the detailed description of the Occupants panel for more information. Create a new building. Creating buildings is quick an easy. You must first choose a suitable location on the play area. The first click will bring up the Quick Orders panel but a second click with bring up the Choose Building Panel. You must now select the building you require. You must have enough of the necessary resources to be able to select the building and you must be in a valid location. The Mine for example must be on high ground where the rock landscape is found. The Pumphouse building must be at low altitude where the ground is soft. You can't build in areas that are not fully explored. One you have chosen a building to create you will be given a Foundation and a Wizard will soon arrive to Magic the building in place. If you do not have enough Magic in storage then this stage will be have to be delayed. General Housekeeping Most building are put into one of two groups. There are the Storage buildings which are used to store people and resources. Examples of these buildings are the Headquarters, Warehouse and the Hospital. Each building of this type can be given a desired level of each element or person. This will let you build a Warehouse with a specific use for example you could build a Warehouse close to your mines, refineries and your Armoury. This building could then be given the desired levels for each element. For this example we could presume that only the Coal, Ore, Water, Peasants and a small amount of food was given a desired level of 20 each. All of the other elements could be reset to Zero which would mean that all the Armour, Stone, Oil and Gold that was made in his area would be taken to the Headquarters while the elements that are useful to these buildings were stored in good quantities. It is also advised to keep the level of Soldiers to a good amount to protect the Warehouse as well as the nearby areas. The other building work in a different way. They have a very much more restricted design with three types of contents. The small area on the left if the food group. This gives enough room for three types of food an there is room one of each item. The upper level of storage is the materials and workers group. These are the people who work/live in the building and also the place where materials are kept. The Refinery would have Coal and Ore as its materials along with a number of peasant workers and also a Guard. The lower section is the output group. This is where the resources are created ready to be taken out to a place of need. Together with the output elements there is also a space for the Cross which is where the workers will end up if they don't get enough food and healthy living. The input group can be changed to fit your needs so if you are running short on peasants then you can choose to only have one Peasant worker. If you only want to make a small slow supply of Bread then you could give the Bakery a level of one Wheat. The output group is not always restricted to resources. The Barracks has an output group that contains Wizards, Soldiers and Archers. These output people are trained from the Peasants. The output group can be altered to suit your needs. If you find you need to train 4 Scientists then you can set the level of scientists to 4 and that is how many you will get. You can set the level to "Full" and the Barracks will train your Scientists until you turn it off. This feature is also useful if you have 3 mines and you don't need much Oil. You can turn off the Oil on two mines which will give them more time to create other resources. Maybe you have a large group of Stone Mason buildings and you would like to turn of Stone mining altogether. Food and Health You will have to provide enough food for you people and you must also ensure that there is enough variety to suit the needs of each person in each job the take on. It has already been mentioned that those Peasants working in the mine will require a different diet to the Scientists working in the laboratory. Each building can contain 3 items of food. The Storage buildings usually contain the full range of food and it is usually in plenty supply. While your people are busy working in the buildings they may decide to eat. At his point they decide exactly which piece of food they require from the menu in that particular building. If that piece of food is not available they will go without food for that period of time. They will loose some energy and they will also loose some of their morale. At the next opportunity for food they may choose a different item and so it is possible to keep a building supplied with just one of the three items on the menu but this is not the best way to keep your people happy. If your people become unhealthy they will not reproduce and they will become easy targets for attackers. If they become too unhappy then they may start to disobey orders and generally become inefficient and worthless. This it is not essential to provide a full range of food it is recommended to attempt to supply as much as you can whenever possible. Guards Every building will contain at least one space for a Guard. It is good to keep someone guarding your buildings because without a guard you are open for a takeover. Without a guard it is possible for an enemy team to enter the building at will. When there are enemy people in the building it usually turns into a fight and the strongest group will take control. While you building is guarded you are still subject to thieves. If a Peasant does make his way into your building he will still be subject to attack by your occupants and for this reason the thieves usually make a quick escape as soon as possible. More Magic The Magic is a useful element in the world of Foundation. It is not only the commonly used system of building but it is also used for landscaping. At any time you can command your Wizard to create some fresh trees and fresh rocks. The rocks are a good source of Coal and Ore but the most common rocks are made of pure Stone. Once the Stone Mason or the Forester have taken their supplied the Magic will soon wear off. The source of the Magic is the Crematorium. This special building will turn the last remains of your people into fresh Magic. This gives you an almost endless supply of Magic to last you for as long as you continue to have a population. Control your People. The control system for organizing your people and issuing commands is a very simple one but from a simple method you have a very complex array of commands ready for controlling your populous. The first lesson to learn is the select. This is done by clicking the mouse in an empty area of the world with thew Left Mouse Button (LMB) and dragging the pointer across the View area to form a box on the screen. When you release the mouse the system will check to see if there were any people in that area when you released the mouse. Any people that were inside the box during hat time will become selected and they will form a group. It is quite possible that your group could contain just one person but it may also contain a large army. Another trick to learn is the SHIFT select option which will allow you to add more people to the group. The SHIFT grab system will give you the added bonus of removing selected people from the group. Now you have a group selected you are able to issue commands. The most basic of these is the MOVE command. The MOVE command is issued using the Right Mouse Button (RMB) to click in an area on the playfield. Now your whole group will start their journey to your selected location. When they arrive you will see they are waiting for your next command. The MOVE command is the most useful command of them all. It gives you the power to direct any of your people to go to any valid destination. The destination doesn't have to be an outside location. You can also command your people to enter buildings. If you send a person into a building it will then become his home. This is where he will stay until you command him to another place. If this building is a production building (for example a Mine) then he will start to work here and possibly take part in delivering goods to other buildings. This is where he will spend the rest of his days unless you command him to move somewhere else. If you alter the settings for his home and it removes the need for his presence then he will then return to a nearby Stores building where he will remain until your next commands. (Many more topics to cover..) -------------------------------------------------------------------------- 8. The Control Panels. A lot of the game is controlled from a wide range of control panels. They provide Statistics as well as an interface to control your world in every last detail. The Main Panel The First Panel you see is known as the Main Panel. From here you can access all of the other Panels. The Main Panel also shows some of the most important Game statistics. The Statistics are as follows... Population - The amount of People in your whole team. This includes every type of person including Peasants and Knights. Buildings - The Amount of Buildings you have. Gold - The most valuable element. The Gold is a good resource to have because it can pay for Training soldiers, repairing buildings and it is also a valuable element to trade with. Production - A level describing the percentage of resources you are making against the resources needed. Land - The amount of land you control. This is the amount of land that you are controlling with buildings. Any wide open areas of land with no buildings is free from control. There are also 6 important buttons on the Main Panel. From here you can access the other panels. These buttons are... Selected Building - When this button is available it will take you to a panel that has all the information about the currently selected building. Selected People - When this button is active it will allow you to see and control your selected people in great detail. Resources - This will display a Global Storage panel which will give you a detailed run down of how many of each resource you have in your Storage buildings. Trading - From the trading panel you can setup trades with other players for resources you need. Alternatively you can also set up direct Stock Exchange which is an instant exchange. The Stock exchange does not give you as much value as a proper trade. (detailed Trading info to be added further on) Statistics - This will take you to the second most important panel the control of the statistics and in-game preferences is an important part of your play. Game Options - The Game options panel gives you general information about the game an the mission. It also allows you to save and load games. You can also find the Quit option in the Game Options panel. The Statistics panel is packed with buttons that will led you to vital information to aid you in your game. Input and Output This panel will display the amount of resources comming in and the amount going out. When you see a Red bar chart it means you are losing more of that resource than you are making. If you see a Green bar then you are safe knowing that you're making more than you are using. If the Green bar is filling the full scale of the chart then you should consider slowing down the prediction. If however the Red bar is filling the scale then you should check for improving the production of this item. If you select one of these elements with a mouse click it will take you through a short-cut to the next panel. Production Chart Here you will see a simple production chart for each element. This is where you can predict any sharp changes in resource usage and attempt to avoid a situation where you're making too much or too little of one element. Building Count Here is a simple display showing how many of each building you have created. This will allow you to make a quick calculation of the building you may need to create next. Death Reports To aid you in the process of cutting down on the number of casualties it is useful to see the causes of the recent deaths. A quick glance at the last 4 deaths can often give you a clue to what can be done to improve your populations life expectancy. There is a small cycle gadget at the bottom of the panel that will take you to a 2nd Death statistic screen. The Popular Deaths chart will display the most frequent causes of Death. This is an extra help in discovering problems with health and other troubles. Production Priority Here you can arrange the various elements in order of need. If you have many Farms you can decide which food you prefer to make. An item with a higher priority will be produced more often than a lower priority element. The Production priority has another use. When you send a Peasant into an enemy building he will leave the building with some stolen goods. The preference of goods to steal is based on the Production Priority. Transport Priority. People and resources must be moved from place to place. This is usually done without any external control. It would be impossible to control 100 people working in 20 buildings moving various resources from one place to another. This is all taken care of by the people who work in the different buildings. While you are always free to take control over a person at any time and command him to do something you want him to do, it is still very useful to let them get on with it. Quite often a building will contain many different items and many different people. Only so much can be removed from a building at any time and sometimes there are less people to carry the resources than you need so some form of preference must be done. This is what the Transport priority is for. The Resources always come ahead of the people in the Priority list so quite often you will see Peasants leaving a building before a Knight, even though the Knight may be above the Peasant in the Priority. This is because the Peasant is moving an important high Priority resource which gives him the advantage over a Knight. The Mission Status. This Panel will show you a simple chart with the current percentage of Mission Completed. You can sometimes see the progress of the other teams but quite often in a Conquest Game you will be the only team taking part in the Mission. Nonetheless you can still use this Panel to keep watch on your progress. The Best & Worst Panel. This is a simple but effective statistic panel. At a quick glance you can see which elements you have 100 much of and which elements you have too little of. The Percentage is calculated by taking the current population and generating some ideal figures for each element. A figure of 200% would indicate that you have two times the recommended amount at this current stage in the game while a figure of 50% means you need to double the production of this type. Multi Statistics. This is where you get some comparisons between each of the players in the current game. you can see just how effective your last attack was or you can get an idea of how stable the other teams are with figures like land ownership, Gold reserve and Army size. Here is a description of the options from left to right. Population - The level of population based on all of your people including your Knights, Peasants and Wizards. Army - This a is based on the amount of Fighting Units you have. This includes Guards, Knights and Archers. Production - The level of resources you are creating. This uses elements such as Coal, Gold, Food and Water. Land Ownership - The amount of land you control. Gold - Simply a level of Gold. Buildings - The numbers of building owned. Technology - The current Tech. level. Everything - A figure based on the average of all other statistics. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- (to be continued...) -------------------------------------------------------------------------- That is all for now... I'll update this manual on a daily basis and future versions of the Foundation Demo will contain the most up-to-date manual. I will upload this manual to the http://www.sneech.demon.co.uk/FoundDemo.html web page as frequently as I can. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- The END (for now...) ------------------------------------------ Paul Burkey - paulb@sneech.demon.co.uk ------------------------------------------