Solasta: Crown of the Magister - Interview @ Morrus

Morrus asked the devs of Solasta: Crown of the Magister some questions:

A Chat With 'Solasta' 5E Video Game Developers

What can you tell us about the world in which this game takes place?

We will be giving more information on the world fairly soon (we plan to introduce our lore during our Kickstarter). We cannot reveal too much, as we want discovering the world of Solasta to be part of the final experience. That being said, Solasta is a High Fantasy universe where players will find most of their favorite playable races, with one notable caveat: they may behave / interact differently than you think, as an ancient cataclysm forged Solasta to its current state.

You might also be interested to know that one of writer is Graeme Davis, one of the original author of Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay back in 1986 - and that he won the Best Writing ENnies at Gen Con this year!

You mention some character types such as a Darkweaver Rogue and a Mountaineer Fighter. Which 5E classes and races can we expect to see in the game?

We would like to include the races and classes found in the System Reference Document of the OGL - though we may not be able to include all of them for our first game. Note however that the SRD only details one subrace per race and one archetype per class, so we will be adding more of those according to our own lore - hence the Darkweaver & Mountaineer. currently we have 4 races / Classes available on our Website: Human / Dwarf / Elf / Halfling, and Fighter / Cleric / Wizard / Rogue. More will be added through Kickstarter.

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More information.

@Myzzrym

Could I ask, if you're using the 5th Edition SRD as a basis for the game, how do you get around the fact that the OGL is a copyleft licence? Is there not an issue that the OGL content in the game is required to be open-sourced itself? I wondered if that might be quite tricky for a commercial game.

Not to be er negative but when it comes to game the only thing that seems to matter to me is the finished product - either i like it or i don't; well sometime i sort of like it and other times i really like it a lot but intentions don't really make up for a lousy game (that's not to say this will be a lousy game - i hope it is fantastic - but even the most best thought out idea won't matter if the game sucks in the end).

How much of the 5E ruleset made it into the game, and how much did you need to change for the new medium?

I actually wrote an article about that particular topic. Long story short I would say that we want to include as much as possible of the ruleset. Some successful games included 70%-80% of the rules, we want to try to go as high as 90-95%. Not because we are fanatics, but because these rules (such as flying and lighting) create interesting gameplay situations. We do not want to pretend to be smart and replace the rules with our own just because. We want to limit rules adaptation to when there is no other choice for the video game media. For example, when vision distance represents 20 monitor screens (longbows…), we have a problem and must adapt it so that the gameplay and visual feedback stays consistent.

It always represents a challenge that is never really that realistic in video games, the actual distance ranges for things like bows, crossbows and other range equipment.
When the longbows range would be several monitor screens and they’d have to scroll over, I don't think any game really tries to address that. They just shorten the ranges, might be interesting to see like enemy spotted detection range, and even if it's off screen play is paused and the game pans over to the enemy where you can take a shot with a longbow if it's in range, even if it's not in the monitor viewing area.

Kickstarter on 3 September:

https://www.solasta-game.com/kickstarter

While I eagerly wait for the Kickstarter campaign to launch with more information, for now, I have a few concerns with this game as well.

There seems to be a lot of emphasis on remaining faithful to P&P rules - while I don't think this is necessarily a bad thing, I think the devs need to understand they are developing cRPG which is very different to P&P environment. For example, there's flexibility with P&P where the DM can cater for the player's situation and experience accordingly, the cRPG will provide more rigid/set scenarios to the players. On the other hand, players don't need to worry about the complex and time consuming rule calculation in cRPG as opposed to P&P. That's why I wondered why the devs chosen what appears to be more simplistic 5e over 3.5e.

I really hope the devs do the implementation right so we can all enjoy the game. Looking forward to try out the demo when the Kickstarter campaign launches.

I'll be there for the kick starter campaign launch. I'm not certain I'll kick in, but I will study and read the pitch.

Originally Posted by purpleblob
I really hope the devs do the implementation right so we can all enjoy the game. Looking forward to try out the demo when the Kickstarter campaign launches.

Will there be a demo? I didn't know that, thanks!

Originally Posted by henriquejr
Will there be a demo? I didn't know that, thanks!

Yep, if you scroll down their website kickstarter info page, they say that the pre alpha demo will be available to everyone. Myzzrym mentioned it will be about an hour long.

Originally Posted by you
Not to be er negative but when it comes to game the only thing that seems to matter to me is the finished product - either i like it or i don't; well sometime i sort of like it and other times i really like it a lot but intentions don't really make up for a lousy game (that's not to say this will be a lousy game - i hope it is fantastic - but even the most best thought out idea won't matter if the game sucks in the end).

Exactly the reason we're releasing a Demo at the same time as the Kickstarter campaign. We're big RPG fans as well, and I've personally been burnt more than a couple of times by backing something I could not play.

Steam info page with Kickstarter date.

https://steamcommunity.com/games/109…83551503643175

Look at that map design!! I love it (although… I hate spiders)

IGN article on Solasta demo (which will be available for everyone via kickstarter campaign):

https://www.ign.com/articles/2019/08…5e-srd-preview