| Last Knights |
Article Index for Last |
Website Links For Last |
Information AboutLast Knights |
|
GAMEPLAY AND FEATURES Map There are four areas in Lastknights, these areas are The Americas , Europe , Africa , and Asia . Each area contains many cities which can be captured as well as a number of fully active playable nations that can cross to other areas. Within the gaming world is a number of different types of terrain confering advantages or disadvantages to units fighting within for this territory with these advantages or disadvantages varying from unit to unit and, as nations have general advantages and disadvantages affecting all units, nation to nation. Of course, the terrain representated within the map is based on real world geography, for instance the Sahara and Gobi deserts are represented by desert and the Alps and Andes are represented by mountain. Countries The Last Knights includes 52 playable countries, each competing with other countries for land and ranking points. Special units and terrain bonuses Each country is unique for its special units and intrinsic terrain bonuses and deficits. A country's special units may be unique to the continent, to a small group of countries, or to the country alone, but the castles of the country will be stocked with these special units as well as the generic ones. The country's intrinsic terrain bonuses and deficits apply to every soldier of the country, and are added to the soldiers' own terrain bonuses and deficits. Headquarters Each country has a headquarters to which every native officer of Brigadier rank or higher has access. Once the headquarters reaches a size of five or more officers, it can court-martial officers in the country to a variety of different privilege levels by majority vote. For instance, it could vote to give a non-native access to the headquarters, or it could remove another officer's ability to create armies. With at least five officers in the headquarters, the body can also elect the country's leader, who can then assign a head command group. The leader and head command, as well as being recognized as the country's leadership, have the power to declare war on other countries and to set a flag signifying their orders to the country. Cities Every city of a country has a city value. This starts at 0 gold/day when the city is captured, but rises by 50 gold/day per turn. Each day at a specific time, every officer receives the total city value of his country. One city is also marked as the capital. This is where officers are placed who have just joined the country or were in a city when it was captured by another country. If the capital city is captured, a new capital city is chosen at random from the country's largest cities. If a group of four or fewer contiguous cities is cut off from the capital, each city has a chance every six hours to "revolt" and become neutral. This chance is inversely proportional to the number of cities in the group, as well as the number of officers in the group of cities. Within Last Knights, there are several different sizes of cities; the smallest lacking castles (where armies are formed and soldiers are recruited) and larger cities including castles as well as stronger garrisons. The largest cities (marked by a purple square) are eligable to become a country's capital city, which possesses an even stronger garrison. Cities lacking castles are strategically important since armies can't be formed while in them and thus the advance or retreat of an army may be dictated in part by the presence of these small cities, for instance they may be the last cities of a country to be captured since officers in these cities are unable to form a retalitory army or recruit additional soldiers. When a country's last city is captured, the country dies and its officers must join other countries. A country's headquarters may also vote to surrender if it has only one city. If this passes, the country dies and its last city becomes neutral. This is done to minimize damage to the country's officers by preventing a final battle. Ranking Country ranking points are cumulative and are calculated every six hours based on the number of cities held by a country and the percentage of the country's officers who have been online during this period. Each country has a world ranking as well as a continent ranking for each continent in which it holds territory. The world ranking is calculated based on all of the country's cities, and the continent ranking on only the cities held in that continent. A country receives a bonus to its world ranking if it is highly ranked in any continent ranking. Won battles also contribute to a country's world ranking. The country with the highest world ranking at the end of an age is considered to have won the age. List of countries The countries are (in alphabetical order):
Officers All officers begin the game as a Corporal. Soldiers can be hired from the local castle (paying each a sigining bonus depending on his experience and a wage that is taken from your available wage). Officers proceed to the training areas, where they and their soldiers will fight to gain experience, increase skills (such as accuracy, healing, etc), and gold. Upon reaching a certain amount of experience, an officer will receive promotion, and thus be given a larger wage, allowing the recruitment of additional soldiers. After reaching the rank of 3rd Lieutenant, officers can join armies and fight together with the other officers within the country. Additional capabilities are obtained upon reaching higher ranks. The officers with a rank of Brigadier or higher in your country can vote to elect a leader. He can be known as the Leader, The Warlord, The King, or the Emperor, depending on his personal ranking in the game. Gold and income Gold is the currency of the Last Knights. It can be used to hire soldiers, and to pay the wages of soldiers already under one's command. Gold is obtained through income and ransom of prisoners. The primary income is a sum of gold which each officer receives every turn. This sum increases with rank, and is used first to pay the wages of the soldiers. Any leftover gold is added to the officer's reserves. If the sum of the wages of the soldiers is greater than the officer's income, the difference is deducted from the officer's reserves each turn. If the sum of the wages of an officer's soldiers is too far below the officer's income, he will not be allowed to hire additional soldiers. The limit for this is known as the "soft cap", and it becomes looser at higher ranks. There is also another limit, known as the "hard cap", beyond which an officer will not be able to promote additional soldiers. This is twice the soft cap for most ranks. Each officer also receives a supplimental income based on the strength of his country. This income is received every 24 hours and is equal to the sum of the city values of the cities held by the officer's country. Finally, gold can be received through the ransom of prisoners. Any time a battle is won, each soldier of the losing side has a 1/6 chance of being captured by a random officer of the winning side. The captured unit then becomes a prisoner of the officer who captured it and its owner must pay a ransom to gain it back. (NPC's automatically ransom their captured soldiers.) Each officer of the losing side also has a 1/6 chance of being captured, and if this happens, half of his gold is distributed evenly among the officers of the winning side. Similarly, if an player-controlled officer of the losing side is killed, all of his gold is distributed in the same manner. Ranks There are 21 ranks in the Last Knights (excluding elective ranks). These ranks are:
There are three elective ranks which provide the same advantage as gaining normal ranks (i.e. increased wage to hire more soldiers). Aside from increased wage, the bonuses of these ranks are identical except upon gaining each rank (starting at Warlord), the player is awarded three Imperial Garde units which are not otherwise available. These elective ranks are:
Soldiers Like the officers, the hired soldiers have ranks and gain experience in a similar manner. There are seven soldier ranks, from Apprentice to Hero. As soldiers achieve higher ranks, they become stronger and much more efficient in battle, but also require more wage. Refer to the Unit Level Table in the Last Knights Reference Guide for more information. Soldiers have a number of attributes; the main ones are:
These attributes will increase with the rank of the soldier, as explained above. Some units are designated as healers. Each time a soldier is injured, a healer has a percentage chance to "heal" or prevent that injury. This probability starts off relatively low but increases as the unit heals (or attempts to heal) more soldiers. Similarly, ranged units have an attribute called "Racc", short for "ranged accuracy", which represents its chance to hit with a ranged attack. Like a healer's chance to heal, the ranged accuracy increases gradually as the ability is used; that is, as the soldier uses his ranged attack. Finally, a soldier marked as cavalry will attack during the cavalry round, an ability that is explained further in the battles section. For a more detailed explanation, refer to the Last Knights FAQ/Help . Battles Battles in the Last Knights involve player characters (officers) and/or non-player characters (NPC officers). These can range from large battles involving the majority of the players of two nations to smaller strikes on weakly defended cities, one-on-one border fights between two player-controlled officers and their armies, and finally training battles between a player and an NPC officer. Types of battles The so-called training battles are initiated by an officer to gain experience and gold. Depending on his rank and location, a player may patrol the market, the beach, or the terrain, or he may attack a village on the border. He then faces a NPC officer and his army. A one-on-one border fight can be initiated by a player on a bordering officer of an enemy country if his target is offline and of equal or higher rank. To prevent the decimation of an army by repeated attack, a player cannot be attacked in such manner for six turns after he was last attacked. On the larger scale, warring nations can attack the cities of one another with the objective of taking control of them. Because of the size of city garrisons, this is rarely done by lone officers, but rather by groups of officers joined in an army. Such battles can range from simple captures of empty cities to battles between the majorities of two countries' fighting forces. If the attackers win, they capture the city and any officers of the losing country left in that city are removed to their country's capital city. If the attackers lose, both sides remain where they were. Battle mechanics During a battle, three distinct phases take place: the ranged phase, the cavalry phase and the melee phase.
different units have different strengths and weaknesses on the different terrain types, this can often completely change the result of PVP battles, as well as main battles When a soldier's hit point count drops below half of its base value, the soldier becomes injured and will no longer fight. A healer has a chance to prevent this injury, as explained in the previous section, and if this happens, the soldier's hit points are restored to full. If instead a soldier's hit point count drops to zero or below, the soldier dies permanently and cannot be healed. When at the end of any combat round one army is left with fewer than half of its soldiers standing, the army flees and the other side wins. If instead both armies are left with fewer than half their soldiers standing, the side with more soldiers standing wins. In the unlikely case that both sides have the same numbers standing, the defender wins. Each soldier and officer in the losing army has a 1 in 6 chance of being captured by a random officer of the opposing army. A captured soldier can be ransomed for gold by the officer to whom he belongs, and a captured officer automatically loses half his gold, which is distributed evenly among the winning officers. If an player-controlled officer is killed and his side loses, his gold is distributed in the same manner. Soldiers and officers injured in battle remain injured after the battle, but they regenerate some of their hit points each turn (officers regenerate 40, soldiers 25) and become unmarked as injured once their hit points recover to full. An officer can also pay to heal himself or any of his soldiers. Injured soldiers and officers will not participate in battles, nor will the armies of injured officers. PLAYERS AND COMMUNITY The Last Knights is a quintessentially multiplayer game. All that happens in the game is done by its players, and the game world is shaped by their actions. Activity Without online players, a country can do little. Online players are needed to join armies to capture cities, and to initiate one-on-one border fights. Thus, player activity is, essentially, a measure of a country's ability to do things. Leadership The core leadership of a country usually consists of the highest-ranking officers in the country in the early stages of the game. The leadership of a country is based on consensus of its players, for it is based around the leader, who is elected. The leadership, as the term denotes, makes all of the decisions of the country, and partakes in the country's diplomacy. Its effectiveness is also often the basis for a country's activity. Diplomacy The only ingame diplomatic states are war and peace. Hence, almost all diplomacy occurs in the meta-game, in interactions between the leaderships of different countries, and is based on trust. The most common diplomatic relations are:
IRC IRC is often used within the Last Knights as an external means of communication between players. Using this method of communication, the leaders of a country can contact other members of a country, especially in a less formal environment than within the game itself. Despite this lack of formality, IRC is often used for planning tactics and battles as well as ordinary banter between comrades. Most countries use IRC and have their own private channels. It is often regarded as a key difference between a country that will thrive, and a country that will fail. HISTORY The Pro/Fun Server Split The split into the "Pro" and "Fun" servers was caused by a divide in the Last Knights community which had been apparent throughout the last few ages. The Last Knights takes place over the course of an age which traditionally lasts around a month after which the countries and their positions are restarted. By the end of the 8th age, it had become apparent that the current system of free joining was not appealing to some since some experienced players tended to join together as 'pre-made countries' (where the leadership was decided before the age began). Thus starting from the 9th age, a system of random joining was implimented. While this appeased some, many believed in the freedom of choice available in free joining. With the beginning of the most recent 11th age and this divide as strong as ever, the decision was taken to split the game into two separate severs: the 'pro server' which has free joining and the 'fun server' with random joining. With this compromise, it is hoped that both groups will be appeased. EXTERNAL LINKS
|
|
|