Battle for Wesnoth

[Anon]

Has anybody played it? I played this game in and out since my teens and it's plenty of fun but unfortunately it's not popular and I've never had people to play and engage more with.

It's a nice turn-based strategy game where you control a tolkien-like faction and fight against others.

There's no pozz at all that I can remember, no ****** characters, all elves and humans are white, it's simple and pure fun without any agenda. The single-player campaigns are also very fun, even worth an adventurer month mayhaps.

The factions play all very different to each other, each with unique mechanics and units. There's deep tactical decisions with terrains, villages to control etc.

This game really deserved to be more popular, extremely underrated.

More details:

► Show Spoiler

The Battle for Wesnoth is an open source, turn-based strategy game with a high fantasy theme. From the plains of Weldyn to the forests of Wesmere, from the mines of Knalga to the soaring peaks of the Heart Mountains, take part in over a dozen adventures spanning centuries! Play as a young prince as he flees the encroaching forces of the Lich Lords to a new home across the sea... Delve into the blackest depths of the earth to craft a jewel of fire itself... Travel the continent in a daring quest to reclaim your rightful throne from a usurping queen... Step into the shoes of a young mage, his village beset by orcish invasion, as he seeks vengeance and immortality... Battle the undead hordes of a foul necromancer as he marches upon your capital... Lead a daring group of survivors across the blazing sands to a final confrontation with an unseen evil... The choice is up to you.

Then take the battle online! Choose from seven fully-balanced factions and duke it out with your friends in over 50 multiplayer maps for parties of all sizes!

Explore hundreds of creative community-made campaigns, maps, and factions for both single and multiplayer, and try your hand at crafting your own! Wesnoth features a built-in map editor, a highly moddable engine, a simple and intuitive scripting language, and a friendly and dedicated modding community. There's no telling what adventures you'll bring to life!

[Irenaeus]

Had to put you out of ignore to even see the post but yeah I have played it and was actually a big fan. It's a very good tactics game imo. The campaigns are eh your mileage may vary

[Anon]

Yeah it's a very underrated game. Campaigns have its high and lows, overall I'd say they have pretty fun stories, in line with oldschool RPGs. Would be great if people were willing to play some games, it's definitely in multiplayer where it shines most (though not in public lobbies where the sweaties have all the game figured out and will gatekeep you out (as they should but for a newbie it's rather unpleasant)). Definitely worth playing for those who never did.

[Breathe]

17 solo campaigns wtf

[Anon]

17 solo campaigns wtf

This is a pretty old game my man, that's in continuous development due to being open source

For reference, AOE 2 has 37 campaigns.

[asf]

is this age of wonders

[WhiteShark]

I played a few missions in one of the campaigns. The low hit chances drove me nuts, but I realize that risk management is an intended part of design. I think I'd have to play more to really get it.

[Anon]

I played a few missions in one of the campaigns. The low hit chances drove me nuts, but I realize that risk management is an intended part of design. I think I'd have to play more to really get it.

In a sense I'd compare it to being a mix of poker and chess, where tactical and strategic decisions matter a lot, but you also need to take risks to get an edge sometimes, which may also backfire depending on your luck.

[Cipher]

It had a lot of woke changes.

The art and the writing for the basic campaign, the one with the Prince in exile, was retooled to present the girl with new art that makes her look more bulky and lines that make her more "EmPoWeReD". The good thing is that you can still decide who becomes the ruler of the realm by giving the fire staff to the one you want to become the ruler.

Then, the art and sprite work for the desert elves in the post-apocaliptic future campaign "Under the Burning Sun" were change to be more ******-like. In the original, they were regular fair skinned and blonde elves. Now, they are pajeets. This is a very good, hard and fun campaign so its a real shame.

By comparison to Sweet Baby Inc-ified games, yeah its great but as much as I like Wesnoth, it has been wokefied since its humble origins. Still a great game and the good thing is that its fairly "simple" to create user generated content so a lot of campaigns are very interesting and do not have any wokeness at all.

And then there's also the skirmish mode, either against bots or against other players online and the core gameplay loop is rock solid.

[Cipher]

I played a few missions in one of the campaigns. The low hit chances drove me nuts, but I realize that risk management is an intended part of design. I think I'd have to play more to really get it.

Yeah, even on the easiest difficulties, Wesnoth really teaches the player that attacking just because you can, doesn't mean you should.

A lot of times its better to create chokepoints so the enemies kill themselves on the counters while trying to attack the only unit available, one that counters them. You never want a fair fight. You need to setup engagements so you are either attacking an enemy that can't retaliate, like an archer attacking a melee unit without a ranged attack, or a hard countering, like a mage attacking a heavy armored soldier that is weak to magic.

The factions also have very detailed playstyles and that's something that is not entirely obvious at first. the "Rebels" meaning the elves are a very balanced faction specially because all elves have both a melee and a ranged attack. The problem is that they won't have good hard counters.

I really like the "Loyalist" faction as its mostly armored men at arms and knights. Setup your engagements to fight in the day, where they are stronger and also create screens with your defensive units so you can outflank and nuke enemies with their cavalry.

I am not going to pretend its an easy game. Even on the easiest difficulty I found it very hard at the beginning but once you get the more cautious approach and start developing good tactics to force engagements that are favorable, the game is extremely fun and addicting.

I recommend the starting campaign as it teaches you all the basics, specially because some maps pit you in unfavorable positions so you also learn to adapt and also learn about good unit deployment. This is a game where units are specialized and that's why the factions have a varied roster with units having mostly 2 paths of promotion to cover a lot of bases.

I am also by no means an expert on the game, if someone is by all means share your thoughts on it. But, I've played it a lot and I really like it, even though I haven't played it since it released on Steam, so many things that I've said could have changed by this point.

[Cipher]

It had a lot of woke changes.

The art and the writing for the basic campaign, the one with the Prince in exile, was retooled to present the girl with new art that makes her look more bulky and lines that make her more "EmPoWeReD". The good thing is that you can still decide who becomes the ruler of the realm by giving the fire staff to the one you want to become the ruler.

Then, the art and sprite work for the desert elves in the post-apocaliptic future campaign "Under the Burning Sun" were change to be more ******-like. In the original, they were regular fair skinned and blonde elves. Now, they are pajeets. This is a very good, hard and fun campaign so its a real shame.

By comparison to Sweet Baby Inc-ified games, yeah its great but as much as I like Wesnoth, it has been wokefied since its humble origins. Still a great game and the good thing is that its fairly "simple" to create user generated content so a lot of campaigns are very interesting and do not have any wokeness at all.

And then there's also the skirmish mode, either against bots or against other players online and the core gameplay loop is rock solid.

I decided to show some comparisons:

Li'sar, the female deuteragonist to Konrad's story:

Original


Redesign



Yeah, the new art is more detailed but, she is supposed to be the same age as Konrad or a little older, but still a very young woman. I don't remember the age exactly, and this may have been changed, but both Konrad and Li'sar where supposed to be late teens, definitely younger than 20 years old.

Also, I found this:

Before version 1.11.5, she was elusive but fragile and had the same movetype and resistances as Assassin or Fugitive.
From version 1.11.5, she is less elusive but more sturdy and has the same movetype and resistances as Royal Guard.

Which makes sense for her age and old art. You could argue that the new art reflects her new version more, but I would say this was done after the fact. I remember the comments in the forums of people praising the new art for looking "like a REAL (TM) woman".

Same with her sprites:

Original


Redesign


At least Konrad, last time I played the Heir to the Throne campaign, wasn't a **** like modern media protagonists. He starts out as naive but he develops into a great commander and a worthy hero alongside the newbie Player.




Now, let's look at some of the elves of the "Under the Burning Suns" campaign. The art here for the originals was extremely rough, as this was not a "mainline" campaign it was add-on that became so popular that they decided to add as a main line campaign but that meant the elves had to become desert pajeets:

Original desert elves:

Kaleh (the Hero)


Nym (his childhood friend/romantic interest)




Redesigned desert elves:

Kaleh


Nym



Couldn't find the original sprites only the new ones.

I remember back in the day in the forums this was the same thing as the changes done to Li'sar, that it "didn't made sense" for the elves living in the desert to be blond and have blue eyes and fair skin, even though the original Kaleh and Nym have tanned skin because of course they would but still had blonde hair and blue eyes.


As I said, compared to modern media this is nothing but let it be known that these changes were made and that the idea was about Li'sar, the female hero of the main campaign becoming a stronk woman that also looks like a "real woman" and to have diversity for the elves since, of course, no other campaign has dark skinned main characters or even rosters. So it wasn't due to "muh realism" it was basically "updated for modern audiences" since the game started to become more popular. Does this destroy the amazing gameplay loop? Of course it doesn't but it detracts from what could have been. The old sprites were rough and needed an update, the "artistic license changes" however, where unwanted and unneeded.

I still recommend the game by the way, last time I checked it was still free so... nothing to lose to try it out, really.

[A Chinese opium den]

It had a lot of woke changes.

The art and the writing for the basic campaign, the one with the Prince in exile, was retooled to present the girl with new art that makes her look more bulky and lines that make her more "EmPoWeReD". The good thing is that you can still decide who becomes the ruler of the realm by giving the fire staff to the one you want to become the ruler.

Then, the art and sprite work for the desert elves in the post-apocaliptic future campaign "Under the Burning Sun" were change to be more ******-like. In the original, they were regular fair skinned and blonde elves. Now, they are pajeets. This is a very good, hard and fun campaign so its a real shame.

By comparison to Sweet Baby Inc-ified games, yeah its great but as much as I like Wesnoth, it has been wokefied since its humble origins. Still a great game and the good thing is that its fairly "simple" to create user generated content so a lot of campaigns are very interesting and do not have any wokeness at all.

And then there's also the skirmish mode, either against bots or against other players online and the core gameplay loop is rock solid.

I decided to show some comparisons:

Li'sar, the female deuteragonist to Konrad's story:

Original


Redesign



Yeah, the new art is more detailed but, she is supposed to be the same age as Konrad or a little older, but still a very young woman. I don't remember the age exactly, and this may have been changed, but both Konrad and Li'sar where supposed to be late teens, definitely younger than 20 years old.

Also, I found this:

Before version 1.11.5, she was elusive but fragile and had the same movetype and resistances as Assassin or Fugitive.
From version 1.11.5, she is less elusive but more sturdy and has the same movetype and resistances as Royal Guard.

Which makes sense for her age and old art. You could argue that the new art reflects her new version more, but I would say this was done after the fact. I remember the comments in the forums of people praising the new art for looking "like a REAL (TM) woman".

Same with her sprites:

Original


Redesign


At least Konrad, last time I played the Heir to the Throne campaign, wasn't a **** like modern media protagonists. He starts out as naive but he develops into a great commander and a worthy hero alongside the newbie Player.




Now, let's look at some of the elves of the "Under the Burning Suns" campaign. The art here for the originals was extremely rough, as this was not a "mainline" campaign it was add-on that became so popular that they decided to add as a main line campaign but that meant the elves had to become desert pajeets:

Original desert elves:

Kaleh (the Hero)


Nym (his childhood friend/romantic interest)




Redesigned desert elves:

Kaleh


Nym



Couldn't find the original sprites only the new ones.

I remember back in the day in the forums this was the same thing as the changes done to Li'sar, that it "didn't made sense" for the elves living in the desert to be blond and have blue eyes and fair skin, even though the original Kaleh and Nym have tanned skin because of course they would but still had blonde hair and blue eyes.


As I said, compared to modern media this is nothing but let it be known that these changes were made and that the idea was about Li'sar, the female hero of the main campaign becoming a stronk woman that also looks like a "real woman" and to have diversity for the elves since, of course, no other campaign has dark skinned main characters or even rosters. So it wasn't due to "muh realism" it was basically "updated for modern audiences" since the game started to become more popular. Does this destroy the amazing gameplay loop? Of course it doesn't but it detracts from what could have been. The old sprites were rough and needed an update, the "artistic license changes" however, where unwanted and unneeded.

I still recommend the game by the way, last time I checked it was still free so... nothing to lose to try it out, really.

These devs just turned all the elves into gypsies because thats what they deserve, its not woke but secretly based.

[Cipher]

It had a lot of woke changes.

The art and the writing for the basic campaign, the one with the Prince in exile, was retooled to present the girl with new art that makes her look more bulky and lines that make her more "EmPoWeReD". The good thing is that you can still decide who becomes the ruler of the realm by giving the fire staff to the one you want to become the ruler.

Then, the art and sprite work for the desert elves in the post-apocaliptic future campaign "Under the Burning Sun" were change to be more ******-like. In the original, they were regular fair skinned and blonde elves. Now, they are pajeets. This is a very good, hard and fun campaign so its a real shame.

By comparison to Sweet Baby Inc-ified games, yeah its great but as much as I like Wesnoth, it has been wokefied since its humble origins. Still a great game and the good thing is that its fairly "simple" to create user generated content so a lot of campaigns are very interesting and do not have any wokeness at all.

And then there's also the skirmish mode, either against bots or against other players online and the core gameplay loop is rock solid.

I decided to show some comparisons:

Li'sar, the female deuteragonist to Konrad's story:

Original


Redesign



Yeah, the new art is more detailed but, she is supposed to be the same age as Konrad or a little older, but still a very young woman. I don't remember the age exactly, and this may have been changed, but both Konrad and Li'sar where supposed to be late teens, definitely younger than 20 years old.

Also, I found this:

Before version 1.11.5, she was elusive but fragile and had the same movetype and resistances as Assassin or Fugitive.
From version 1.11.5, she is less elusive but more sturdy and has the same movetype and resistances as Royal Guard.

Which makes sense for her age and old art. You could argue that the new art reflects her new version more, but I would say this was done after the fact. I remember the comments in the forums of people praising the new art for looking "like a REAL (TM) woman".

Same with her sprites:

Original


Redesign


At least Konrad, last time I played the Heir to the Throne campaign, wasn't a **** like modern media protagonists. He starts out as naive but he develops into a great commander and a worthy hero alongside the newbie Player.




Now, let's look at some of the elves of the "Under the Burning Suns" campaign. The art here for the originals was extremely rough, as this was not a "mainline" campaign it was add-on that became so popular that they decided to add as a main line campaign but that meant the elves had to become desert pajeets:

Original desert elves:

Kaleh (the Hero)


Nym (his childhood friend/romantic interest)




Redesigned desert elves:

Kaleh


Nym



Couldn't find the original sprites only the new ones.

I remember back in the day in the forums this was the same thing as the changes done to Li'sar, that it "didn't made sense" for the elves living in the desert to be blond and have blue eyes and fair skin, even though the original Kaleh and Nym have tanned skin because of course they would but still had blonde hair and blue eyes.


As I said, compared to modern media this is nothing but let it be known that these changes were made and that the idea was about Li'sar, the female hero of the main campaign becoming a stronk woman that also looks like a "real woman" and to have diversity for the elves since, of course, no other campaign has dark skinned main characters or even rosters. So it wasn't due to "muh realism" it was basically "updated for modern audiences" since the game started to become more popular. Does this destroy the amazing gameplay loop? Of course it doesn't but it detracts from what could have been. The old sprites were rough and needed an update, the "artistic license changes" however, where unwanted and unneeded.

I still recommend the game by the way, last time I checked it was still free so... nothing to lose to try it out, really.

These devs just turned all the elves into gypsies because thats what they deserve, its not woke but secretly based.

Only the desert elves of the far flung future of the setting after the apocalypse happens. So... in their minds, after all is said and done, the gypsies will rule the land. At the time of "Under the Burning Suns" humans have been extinct for centuries.

Again, I played that campaign a long, long time ago, before they turned them into pajeets so maybe the lore has changed but that's what it was originally.

[rusty_shackleford]

Redesign

That middle aged man looks like he's seen some stuff.

[Irenaeus]

Oh great, they traded the hot elf girl for an ugly and fat ****.

[Orvas Dren]

looks alright besides the Stroggification of the hot elf princess. If others here start playing I probably will too

[Kalarion]

I'd play.

[Nemesis]

Li'sar, the female deuteragonist to Konrad's story:

Original


Redesign

This is an improvement. The less anime looking, the better, even if she looks like Elon Musk.