Expansion Idea/theme

[Younghappy]

First, some theme music (from the GD media music section!)

So this idea is inspired by Jonah Hex (a wickedly cool character ). Jonah is a gunslinger (a gunfighter like those of the Old/Wild West) and his weapons are, obviously, a gun (a revolver to be exact) and, not so obviously (but still epic), a tomahawk.



Anyway, here goes my idea; a Wild Western frontier. The main town is a typical Old Western area, with the main buildings being a Police Station (the HQ of the town, with a jail inside), a Bank (where the "Caravan" NPC is located behind a counter/desk), and a Saloon (where the barman - a merchant that sells Mercenary Contracts, in the form of scrolls - can be found). Mercenary Contracts grant the ability to summon named allies, such as the notorius shootist Bill Lasker.



The town in my idea is called Blackwater. Three main NPCs are located within the town:

• Captain Solon, former Imperial soldier given command of Blackwater by the residents. He has a natural dislike of mercenaries - and is at odds with Steek because of it - and is distrusting of Harlow, claiming he has outlaw affiliations.
  
  
  
  
• Steek, former mercenary and rival of Captain Solon. He can be found standing on the roof of the Police Station, near a gatling gun.
  
  
  
  
• Harlow, owner of a railway station outside Blackwater. He gives the player a quest to liberate his station of bandits - who have taken up residence there as a defense against the Aetherials/Chthonians - and later on to venture into a locomotive graveyard (a dumping ground of old/retired train models or parts = really creepy) to kill a boss wearing this set.
  
  

Blackwater is not only threatened by the Aetherials and Chthonians, but also by an outlaw gang led by "Black" Abram, a fashionable gunslinger that may just attempt to raid and occupy Blackwater to save himself and his crew from the invaders, because the town is more easily defensible than the Abram Gang's current hideout.



Abram is also a quest-giving NPC, and his gang (as is Blackwater) a faction. Abram's Gang has two quest-givers, Abram himself and his bodyguard, a brutish bandit known as Wild Duke, whose as deadly with a gun as he is with a explosives (Wild Duke would have a skill where he throws dynamite sticks like the ones in his belt).



The final quest of either faction involves a raid on the opposing faction's base (Blackwater if siding with Abram Gang, Abram Gang's Den if siding with Blackwater).
Siding with either one will cause reputation with the other to immediately drop to zero/hostile, and the final quest will entail killing each member of the opposing faction (except for the merchants/caravan NPCs).
A cool pro of this quest would be you get to fight alongside members of the faction you choose to side with, while fighting members of the opposite faction. A downside however, it would be difficult to implement.
Once all enemy members are dead, the ending of this quest would be a short scene where your player is frozen to the spot (not literally frozen, he/she just can't move/fight) and the leaders of both factions face off in a shootout. The leader of the faction you sided with (Captain Solon if Blackwater, Black Abram if the outlaws) would have more health than the enemy leader, thus a guaranteed victory for your side, and it would look cool.

Cheers for reading this idea of mine, I hope you like it and feedback, as always, is welcome!
I leave you with a sinister pic of Black Abram, and bid you goodnight!



Cheers,
Younghappy

[Millsw]

I like it. A lot.

Great idea,although I do see it taking some work to implement. However, I'd pay for this!

[Younghappy]

Thanks! A long-time favourite theme of mine has been the Old/Wild West, and when I first proposed this idea (in a lot less detail) I read some of the comments saying the "Old West can't be grim", so I decided to make this to show that it can be.
And yes, I can also see this taking time to implement, but Crate has stated that after the first release of Grim Dawn, expansions will follow every 6 - 10 months, which I reckon would be good time to make this, if like an Old Western theme.
Anyway, your feedback is appreciated!
Cheers,
Younghappy

[Thelionheart]

Now, I don't want you to think I'm shitting on your idea. I like the idea and how you've fleshed it out. I guess in order for me to "get" your idea would require for me to see a visual of how it would look. I see you're using screens from Red Dead Redemption and, I think, Gun. Those games aren't nearly dark enough for what I see Grim Dawn being. I think if your idea was put in a different game then I'd eat that up like Rosie O'Donnell on cheesecake.

Now, I like your idea of mercenaries but Medierra has stated that they can't implement them at the first release. The quote in question:
"Unfortunately, given everything on our plate right now, I don't think we'll be able to get mercenaries in GD. Although, it is something I really want to do at some point in an expansion or the next game. " Now, your expansion could be the one to implement it, I just don't see it happening.

I don't think trains are in, especially working ones given that humans are in hiding from the Cthonians and Aetherials. I don't see anyone in their right mind going onto a vehicle that big and that loud under those circumstances. The best quote I could find on this was this one, but I don't think we can as of yet completely rule out the possibility of trains just from this quote.

"We want to keep the world gritty, brutal, and somewhat primal despite taking place in a more advanced time period. Although there aren't any current plans for combustion-powered vehicles, I think a crude, smoky, gas-powered chainsaw would be more appealing to me than a high-fantasy techno-magic chainsaw or a steampunk design that bordered too much on sci-fi. I'm not against steam powered machinery necessarily but I want it to be crude and clunky and not cross over into the realm of sci-fi that a lot of steampunk stuff does."


Again, I love the idea, it's just I don't think it'll fit. I'd love to be proven wrong though because I love westerns.

[Younghappy]

Originally Posted by Thelionheart

Now, I don't want you to think I'm shitting on your idea.

Of course not! In fact, I love your feedback. You see, I too have seen those quotes about the non-steampunk, and I guess I forgot to flesh this part out a bit more. The trains aren't working, at least not the way I saw it. They would have been working before (and just so you know, by trains I mean locomotives, the old steam trains) and the locomotive graveyard (see the link in the OP) is more what I was thinking of. Ruined, rusty, creepy and not working trains that have been piled together in a scrapheap never to be used again. This is how I imagined the trains. Also, I get med's comment on the mercenaries. If it was implemented how I said in the OP, it would require a unique look, itemization and feel for each mercenary. That would be tough, I get that.
Btw, it's good to see we both like Westerns, that means your feedback is more reasonable!
Just so you know, the reason why I went with RDR screens was because the outfits seemed perfect for nitty gritty, with the eyepatches and dynamite and crazy stuff like that.
Cheers for the feedback again,
Younghappy

[Josho]

Originally Posted by Younghappy

You know what caught my eye? Having a helm and belt just like this in game (sticks of dynamite wrapped). It would be bloody brilliant!

[Younghappy]

It is rather epic, and it could grant the skill to throw sticks of dynamite! Muhahaha!

[Executioneer]

would have good visuals and appear intimidating!

[bluswordgrl]

I've got a question. Why would they let a huge resource like out-of-commission trains just rust? You said you were talking old steam engines which are made out of iron, right? I for one would be scavenging it. Melt it down or if I could get the manpower, maybe drag one off to make my home in! Heck, with enough cars you could build your town out of it!
Say an enterprising widow with a couple of these cars might even build a swanky little inn. But, no funny stuff or her non-human doorman will toss you out! This ain't no saloon or House of Ill Repute, you know!

[Younghappy]

Originally Posted by bluswordgrl

I've got a question. Why would they let a huge resource like out-of-commission trains just rust? You said you were talking old steam engines which are made out of iron, right? I for one would be scavenging it. Melt it down or if I could get the manpower, maybe drag one off to make my home in! Heck, with enough cars you could build your town out of it!
Say an enterprising widow with a couple of these cars might even build a swanky little inn. But, no funny stuff or her non-human doorman will toss you out! This ain't no saloon or House of Ill Repute, you know!

Ah, but if it's overrun with monsters, who but a hero would go there? Maybe that could be a quest, bring back X amount of scrap metal to use for repairing/upgrading the defenses of the Old Western survivor town Blackwater