"Who knows how many characters and dynasties fell due to the dreaded Dynasty History System?"
"How many players were unwittingly put against each other?"
"However, for those who succeeded and were wise enough to make a character before the servers started up and Dynasties Online had become a behemoth in the world."
"The rewards were exponential!"
Lee Smith, CEO of Emart.
…..
[3 skill points automatically assigned to military strategy!]
[3 skill points automatically assigned to leadership!]
[Military Strategy (Intermediate) skill automatically gained!]
[Leadership skill (Intermediate) automatically gained!]
[Swordsmanship skill selected!]
[3 skill points assigned to swordsmanship!]
[Swordsmanship (Intermediate) gained!]
[10 CP spent on skill Riding! 19 CP remaining!]
[ Riding (Novice) skill gained!]
[1 skill point assigned to leadership!]
[10 CP spent on skill Negotiation! 9 CP remaining!]
[Negotiation (Novice) skill gained!]
[9 CP spent on gold, 0 CP remaining!]
[18 gold acquired!]
[7 gold coins turned successfully into 70 silver coins]
[1 gold coin turned successfully into 1000 copper coins]
[Fallen Martial Starter Kit acquired!]
As Reginald continued with his choices for character creation, many system notifications appeared in front of him and he closed them all down. After that, he looked over his character status, happy with his choices, skills and stats. He also made sure to have all 3 types of currency so that he did not have to overpay or have people struggle to give him change.
…..
Character Name: Railius Aurellion
Dynasty: Aurellion
HP: 35
MP: 50
Age: 18
Race: Half Dwarf
Faction: N/A
Attributes:
Strength: 8
Agility: 7
Dexterity: 7
Vitality: 7
Intelligence: 10
Wisdom: 10
Charisma: 10
Equipment:
Fallen Martial Nobles Starter Kit.
Money:
Gold: 10
Silver: 70
Copper: 1000
Skills:
Military Strategy: (Intermediate) (Passive)
Description: Helps to dictate how well you can strategise. This can increase defence or damage in certain formations as differing generals specialise in different types of units and formations. Also can help persuade people your battle plan is good, the higher your level of military strategy, the more likely people are going to believe that your strategy will work.
Effect: 15% increase of damage and defence for troops under your command in tight formations. 15% increase in damage and defence for a particular troop type. May be consulted by those higher in command as the intermediate is the rank most martially educated nobles start at or those who have attended a military academy in DO.
An essential requirement for lower-level command positions and officer jobs.
Swordsmanship: (Intermediate) (Passive)
Description: general swordsmanship used in self-defence and learning techniques to do more damage and wield a sword. Those with more skill in swordsmanship can deal catastrophic damage as each rank raised in swordsmanship increases damage and skill with the weapon.
Effect: Increases damage with sword-type weapons by 30%.
May change or be adapted into specific styles for Increased effects and a style must be created or adopted to raise the skills rank past expert.
Skill is Limited to the expert rank.
Leadership: (Intermediate) (Passive)
Description: Leadership helps define well you lead people. This can be people in an army or a refugee party and can affect people's morale and resolve. A person with very high leadership skills may be able to have his entire army fight to the death.
Effect: increase the morale of troops or people under your command by 15%.
Gives choice of 1 leadership-based active skill.
Increases people's loyalty to you.
Riding: (Novice) (Passive)
Description: Riding dictates how well you ride a horse. This can give you access to better horses and increase your, speed, manoeuvrability and combat prowess while mounted and help you to tame wilder horses if you come across them.
Effect: Allows horses to be mounted and to be ridden at a trot with no problems. Horses must be already docile to be ridden. Able to fight on a horse, but your ability will be limited.
Negotiation: (Novice) (Passive)
Description: Negotiation is the skill for bartering, based on the Charisma attribute, higher levels of negotiation will help you in bartering and making deals and transactions. This can be useful in political affairs, helping to strike deals between nations or in day-to-day transactions helping a struggling family afford a loaf of bread.
Effect: Able to negotiate with more people. 5% increase in the chance of a successful negotiation. Skill is affected by how much people know and their ability to lie and manipulate information.
Rallying Call: (Active) 5 MP
Description: Send out a cry rallying your men for a short time, acts of valour can increase the effectiveness and the range can be expanded using a tool such as a horn or a drum.
Effect: Units under your command have their morale is refilled and can lead to fleeing units coming back to fight. Increase fighting prowess by 10% for 1 minute as people are motivated by you to fight harder.
Race Traits:
Interspecies Humanoid Reproduction: Humans have high compatibility biologically with other races leading to many diverse offspring and genetics as long as they have similar ways of giving birth to new life.
Effect: Allows for the creation of half races, such as half-elves, half dwarfs and other half races, which the player could choose to become, allows for you to pick which characteristics of each race that he prefers if there are multiple generations of intermingling races, then a bloodline which inhabits 3 different races attributes can be created as long as there is enough genetic material available however certain effects may be decreased due to not having a pure genetic makeup.
Stout of Heart: Dwarfs are not easily intimidated and are known to be very stubborn at times and hard to manipulate for a person unfamiliar with them.
Effect: Morale on the battlefield increased by 20%. 50% resistance to being influenced by outsiders. Unable to be scared or enter a frightened state. 50% resistance to all things related to intimidation.
Versatile: Humans have various skills and crafts and are not specialised in any one thing allowing them to pursue what they enjoy and leading to well-rounded cultures and nations; however, they will lose out to more specialised races who are good at specific fields.
Effect: Balanced stat distribution at Character Creation, allowing for more customisation. Allows for extra customisation when deciding nation and faction specialities; however, you will find that effects are not as potent compared to other races but have fewer downsides and allows for more choice as well as more stat points to be assigned by the player.
Inheritable Dynasty Traits:
Fallen Noble: (Inheritable Dynasty Trait)
Description: A Noble of a fallen house. It could be a house of traitors, a noble who has lost his territory due to conflict with another, or other reasons for a noble house to lose its power and lands. These nobles start with powerful enemies and are out to get them. They include nobles who survived the calamity of their house and now live in exile elsewhere.
Effect: Grants status of noble across the world, granting you more rights and privileges except in the country or lands to which an enemy of the house is actively hunting the dynasty to extinction.
Grants the Player the Fallen Noble Starter Kit
Depending on house history house may be granted servants and other human resources.
Fallen Martial House: (Inheritable Dynasty Trait)
Requirements: Fallen Noble Trait
Description: A Fallen Martial House is a noble family with a reputation for being good military commanders and strategists. They used to lead armies and be well respected among their own and neighbouring nations for these traits. However, due to political intrigue or for some other reason, has lost their power and are now in hiding or exile.
Effect: Will be famous amongst your home nation and the nations around for coming from a family of generals and will find it easier to enter a kingdom's military due to family reputation; however, trust will be hard to gain.
Members of the dynasty can gain 1 free skill point/upgrade in military strategy if educated primarily in marshal practices and enough time is devoted to learning about strategy.
Members of the dynasty can gain 2 free skill points/upgrades in any combat skill of their choice. If trained and enough time has been spent training the combat skill, this includes skills such as riding.
Members of the Dynasty can gain 1 free skill point in leadership if enough time has been spent training the skill.
When forming nations and factions, there will be more combat-orientated options for customisation.
Due to the family being well known, it is easier for them to be recognised and for information to go out to their enemies.
Upgrades Fallen Noble Starter kit to Fallen Noble Martial Starter Kit allows you to take the martial mentor trait as if you were from a Martial House.
Allows for military skills to go to the expert rank during character creation.
Character Traits:
Sworn Martial Mentor General Path (Character Trait)
Description: Was trained at a young age by a skilled warrior and strategist sworn to the noble family in some sort of high position. Your sharp intelligence and your charismatic ability outshone your physical abilities. This led to your mentor focussing mainly on strategy and leading armies. However, it also included basic training in self-defence for when you inevitably go to the battlefield to test your strategic skills.
Effect: Grants 2 skill points in military strategy.
Grants 1 skill point in a weapon skill of choice.
Grants 2 skill points in leadership.
Grants a skilled subordinate who will serve you loyally and is proficient in martial skills.
…..
After looking at his stats for a bit, he was surprised by a system notification which appeared not long after.
[Dynasty history system activated!]
[Fallen Noble, Fallen Martial House and Sworn Martial Mentor background traits detected.]
[All background traits are linked to each other, please describe how your noble house fell. Also, please make sure the history lines up nicely with the traits.]
[You may enter something brief however the system will then fill in the blanks.]
After that, a screen came up for him to type in a dynasty history of his in-game character as he started to write a rather detailed character history and was surprised at some of the questions asked by the system for its clarification but also to ensure that it fits well with the world of Dynasties Online with some of the questions that came up being expected.
[Please choose a nation for your dynasty to originate from.]
After he read the notification, a massive map appeared in front of him detailing the many nations present in Dynasties Online, each with its own history, culture and political systems. After looking through 5 nations, he decided that he did not want to overload his brain with information on the others, so he decided on one of the ones he had looked through before coming to a decision.
[Chavarian Empire selected]
After the notification appeared, a brief history of the Chivarian Empire appeared before him.
The Chavarian Empire lies in the Alendel Steppe, with the mighty Alenwyre River flowing through it, providing the much-needed fertile farmland for the recent population explosion. A nation made from three human kingdoms which used to dominate the central steppe and the conquests of some small areas from the United Beastmen States to the east and the Krithen Dynasty to the southwest has turned it into a superpower known for its strong cavalry and unmatched steeds. Currently going through a golden age of prosperity due to its recent victories and the wise rule of its founding emperor, its future looks bright due to a sagacious successor and loyal, capable ministers.
After the death of the legendary general Drusus Dardanius, who helped to forge the empire, winning the legendary Chavarian War for Unification 20 years ago and taking the southern mountain stronghold of Felendril from the Kingdom of Nathia 2 years later, they came up against the great bulwark of Nathia, The Kings Sword Great General Ranier Lantier. Since he took command of Northern forces based in Nartook Fortress, every invasion made by the empire has ended in catastrophic casualties and defeats, earning Ranier the title of Crestiers Bane based on the last name of the imperial family of the Chavarian Empire.
[Please describe your dynasty's backstory in the Chavarian Empire and how they initially gained power.]
After doing so, he continued to answer many other questions. This took him many hours as he made his dynasties' history significantly impact the world.
[Did your family lose power in your father's time as head of the family or before?]
[How did your character's father lose power?]
[Why did your character's father lose power?]
[Are you sure you want to make the Crestier family the reason for your father's fall, turning the entire empire into your enemy?]
[where would your character be at the start of the game?]
[How did you survive the calamity of your house?]
[Please name the subordinate and future mentor for your character.]
[All necessary questions have been answered. Thank you user, for your cooperation]
[Dynasty history events have been created and sorted into chronological order.]
[All these events must be completed successfully before the release of the game by the end of the 2nd of February, or your dynasty will be eradicated]
[Please note that these events can affect your character still and grant and take away traits depending on how they unfold]
[The First Event, The Rise of House Aurellion, has been created. Would you like to enter it?]
The final 2 notifications once again stunned Reginald as he asked the friend system in disbelief as the last notification had 2 options 'Yes' or 'Later.'
"Friend System, what the hell is this? What is with these events? I thought that the servers were not opened yet. What's this about my Dynasty being eradicated?"
Reginald's tone was laced with anger however, very quickly he got a reply from Friend System with a slightly evil smirk appearing on his sadistic lips.
"After the many curveballs that you have experienced so far, is it so surprising? This is a video game, yet there is no level system. Does that not scream odd to you? Also, you have chosen a character who profoundly affects the world, even pulling one of the 3 empires in the game into your backstory."
"Did you really think that you can become a fallen martial noble with a skilled subordinate under his command so easily? That you would not have to fight for it and that you would get it presented to you on a silver platter!"
Friend System said back to Reginald in a cold tone, almost as if he was insulted by Reginald's lack of intelligence, before continuing more kindly.
"Firstly, this is a privilege given only to those who took the opportunity and had the foresight to pre-order the game and load it up to create your character before the game's servers officially open with the option to better integrate your dynasty into the game. Also, certain options such as the ability to start as a landed or a fallen noble will be extremely restricted."
"This is because a backstory like yours would be impossible once the servers start as the history of the world would have been decided, especially when your backstory includes you becoming an enemy of one of few empires in the world. That reminds me, I want to ask you."
"Are you all right in the head?"
"Depends on your definition of sane. Anyway, I only have 2 days to complete them."
Reginald subconsciously said both to himself and the Friend System before replaying what the Friend System had told him in his head. He then asked.
"Is there a limit to how much I am allowed to play the game?"
"To allow people like yourself who have multiple events that could take many in-game days to successfully complete character creation currently there is not."
Reginald heaved a sigh of relief, but after going over what the friend system said, he asked.
"What do you mean by currently?"
"Will there be a limit when the game is released fully?"
The Friend System replied quickly.
"That is correct. When the game is fully released, the servers will open at 8 am and close at 8 pm to allow you some time in the day to cook and do any other activities you want to at night, such as going to the gym."
After learning how time will flow in the game more precisely, he returned to another question that was bothering him.
"So the history and backstory of the game are not already made?"
"Not entirely no, this will allow the players who make their characters before the servers start to get some in-game experience and allow the players to have an effect if only limited to being a well-known lumberjack on the world of Dynasties Online."
"Oh, by the way, if you fail or your character dies in any of these events, your dynasty will be eradicated. Have fun."
Friend System reminded before waiting to see what would happen as the humanlike AI who created this history and challenge for Reginald, the AI was quite interested in the outcome.
After composing himself for a few seconds, he pressed the Yes button on the screen in front of him. The world around him seemed to melt away before reforming again as he was transported for the first time into Dynasties Online and into the first event of his in-game dynasties history.