[NaB] [A10 R293 x64] Footmen with low courage run from monsters

One of my footman gets scared of incoming goblins/zombies and runs away from them just like if he was a regular citizen. Sadly, he has somehow managed to level up but still won’t attack the goblins unless I activate town defense mode. It wouldn’t be a problem if it was a situation where he was outnumbered or just sometimes got scared, but it’s every single time.

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All of my footmen respond the same way when the wolves attack. Unless I force defense mode, they just won’t fight.

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Every hearthling has a courage stat, which depends on their spirit stat. You can see courage and spirit on the character sheet. All monsters have a menace stat, which is invisible. If a person’s courage stat is less than the monster’s menace stat, then the person runs away from the monster.

Becoming a footman buffs courage, and town defense mode buffs it further. Eventually we want a tutorial that explains all the systems and how they work, but since all the systems are currently in flux and may change, we’re putting off an in-game tutorial until later. :slight_smile:

Edit: At the moment, the monsters menace stats are calculated so that most people are able to fight goblins, some people are able to fight undead, and only the most courageous footmen can fight wolves.

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That’s great to know! I’ll have to look at that and actually give some thought as to who I make a footman!

I assume this same system is in place for other professions that will make a hearthling more or less proficient at a profession?

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This is awesome, and also excellent knowledge, thank you!

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The stats are mostly important for footmen at the moment, but yes, the idea is that smart crafters would make more cool items, etc. :slight_smile: Coming eventually!

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Perhaps they just need training in the art of combat by the Brave Sir Robin.

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I thought Mind influenced how often the Carpenter put out ‘Fine’ furniture? Is this not the case?

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This is awfully deterministic. Any chance this could be changed so that the difference in courage and menace would instead create some kind of scaled chance at staying put and fighting? Say, if you’ve got a 10 courage footman and a 20 menace monster, right now it sounds like the footman will always run away. How about he just has a 50% chance of running away? Then a 40 menace monster and the same footman would give the footman a 25% chance of running away. Percentages are for example only, it would have to be balanced, of course.

I’m just thinking, in a game like Dungeons and Dragons, even if the big scary monster has a way higher armor class than you could possibly hit with your weapon and attributes, you still have a chance at a critical roll of the dice which lets you hit anyway. There’s also stuff like Isildur cutting off the One Ring from Sauron’s hand, even though Sauron was a horrifyingly scary opponent and should never have been defeated.

With such a deterministic courage/menace system, none of the hearthlings or goblins for that matter have a chance at improbable acts of courage in the face of terror. I think that’s unfortunate, and it also means if you encounter a scary enough monster in the game, you are just totally screwed.

The other suggestion I would have is that perhaps hearthlings could be more courageous when they’re near another footman. It only makes sense that when you know you have back-up that you’ll be braver. What if footmen (and other soldier types) had some kind of stacking courage aura?

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Indeed. A downright army of twenty footmen shouldn’t be scared of a single wolf, no matter how monsterphobic they are.

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