The peninsula of Calderia is about 40,000 km² / 15,400 mi² in size (roughly equivalent to Switzerland). The land is divided into provinces governed by various noble Houses.
Although the interests of the nobility are mostly focused on the main cities of each province, the roads between them are bustling with life: busy crossroads may have thriving villages, and ancient temple ruins may hold secrets to be discovered by those who dare to seek them out. Seaports are a melting pot for sailors, vagabonds, fishermen, bazaars, and traders from faraway lands.
While your family members are on the road, they are bound to encounter the enticing wonders that Calderia has to offer. Depending on their location, they may be treated to a Location Event.
Characters may also pass by each other's cities or meet on the road; be they friends or foes. Sometimes events related to two characters meeting by chance may occur. Sometimes multiple families are invited to spend time in the same place, such as at weddings. In such situations, one is bound to run into new acquaintances or confront sworn enemies. However, if you're harbouring a vendetta, it's not civilized to act on it while being someone else's guest.
As mentioned in our "Diplomacy: Squire, ward, court" Steam News, one of the most powerful diplomatic actions a noble House can take is to send its family members to live in a foreign court as wards, squires, or court members. These family members are by no means forgotten. Things can happen in their lives just as they can with anyone else, but the events they experience will be related to their duties and lives in the other House's court. You will also receive events related to the incidents that revolve around other Houses' characters living in your own court.
Finally, your family members may find their lives boring or unfulfilling. In these rare cases, they might embark on a Character Journey.
A Character Journey is a series of events that the characters undertake of their own volition. While you may not be able to stop them or even control where they go, you'll have a chance to decide what they do in the adventures they encounter. Character Journeys are extremely rare, occurring maybe once in a character's lifetime, but when they do, they're bound to change the character's view of life somehow.
How would you like your House's members to interact with Calderia's locations?
The demo will be live from March 31st until April 10th. We're sending the keys & instructions manually so it might take some time to receive a key but we'll make sure to include as many players as possible.
We really want to hear your thoughts about any aspects of the game (likes & dislikes, ideas for improvement) so feel free to share your feedback on our steam forum or on Discord: https://discord.gg/vsxD6n8P8J
For bug reports, please take screenshots and be as precise as possible so we can reproduce them and fix them!
- Great Houses of Calderia Team -
Intrigue: Spies
Oy spies!
Maintaining good diplomatic relationships between the various Houses is a crucial aspect of your House's success. But what do you do when other Houses refuse to cooperate or even try to obstruct you? You hire spies, of course.
How does spying work in Calderia?
The core mechanics of the Great Houses of Calderia revolve around diplomatic, economic, militaristic, and intrigue actions. Intrigue actions are risky endeavors that aim to harm and hinder your opponents, and they begin with recruiting lackeys to do your bidding.
Every now and then, a House may send one of its family members on an official visit to another fiefdom. The purpose of this visit, at least on the surface, is to improve relations between the two Houses, making future cooperation easier. However, the best possible spies a House could have can be found within the walls of their court. Someone inconspicuous, always there but rarely noticed, like a kitchen maid or a stable boy.
Anyone could be a potential spy, but finding and employing one is a dangerous task. Not dangerous enough to risk a noble's life and start a war, but risky enough to sever relations between the two Houses for a long time. Once a target is found, one must think of the best way to approach them with this delicate matter. Lower-class servants might be persuaded with threats, as they might feel they have no other option than to obey. A dissatisfied guard could be bought with a sizeable sum of money. The blacksmith used by the court could perhaps be persuaded with a promise of wealthy new clients. It always starts with a promise: "All you have to do is be our eyes and ears, and when we ask for something to happen, you'll find the right people to do it. You'll be perfectly safe."
That is, of course, a lie. The traditional punishment for spying throughout Calderia is gibbeting. Gibbeting is a form of punishment where the culprit is placed inside a cage that is hung from a high place until they die.
How does it work in the game?
Once you've hired a spy, you may ask them to perform various nefarious acts. Knowledge is power, and the information you have about the enemy family is shown as Intrigue Level. Think of Intrigue Level as knowledge about itineraries, guard shifts, vulnerabilities in structures, blackmailable secrets, etc. Each level of intrigue in the enemy fiefdom increases the success chance of your spy actions. Each spy you have in the enemy's court increases your intrigue level in that fiefdom by one (up to four). The members of your family in that fiefdom also increase the intrigue level by two (children by one). However, your family members cannot and will not perform spy actions.
Only a fool would think that there aren't any spies within their own ranks as well. To counter incoming spy attacks, each fiefdom must develop and maintain Safety. Safety is an abstract resource that is developed by the population working in your castle. As you gather that resource, your Safety Level increases (up to four levels). Think of Safety Levels as increased guard patrols, bureaucracy, and workplace protocols, undercover workers reporting naysayers, etc. The Safety Level of your fiefdom directly decreases the success chance of enemy spy actions. In addition to the general safety level, each profession overseer brings their expertise to the table, either increasing or decreasing the safety of the profession they watch over for a little bit. Even dormant spies can be found from time to time with good Safety measures.
How can spies serve my house?
Enough about the technical stuff. Let's say your neighbor has a lot of iron ore that you would like to buy from them, but all you have to offer is grain crops. They are reluctant to sell because they have bountiful fields of their own and don't really need your grain. You've tried to explain that it's good to have excess in storage for a rainy day, but they still refuse.
It's time to make it rain, then...
You send a message to your spy that a small "accident" needs to happen at their fields or granaries - maybe a misplaced torch or an invasion of rats. You don't really care how it's done. You send them a small amount of money and instruct the spy to find some lowlifes to carry out the task, with the money serving as compensation for their troubles. A day or two passes and you eagerly wait for news. Finally, you hear a rumor that all the grain mills your neighbor had have been burned down during the night. You think to yourself, "Splendid," as you send your condolences and offer to support them in these hard times by selling them grain in exchange for iron ore.
At the same time, your spy is getting nervous. They’ve also heard of the fire, but none of the hired men has returned to collect the rest of their payment. Rumour has it, that the overseer of Farmers has taken the matter very seriously, and is currently rigorously investigating who gave the order to sabotage them. Each month they spend investigating the matter, the closer they get to finding out who did it. If they do, their House can accuse you of your actions, and demand rightful compensation for it. In any case, your spy must lay low until either the dust settles or they face the gibbet.
Would you hire spies to protect your heritage?
Join our Discord to get involved in the development of Great Houses of Calderia: https://discord.gg/vsxD6n8P8J
- Great Houses of Calderia Team -
New public playtest!
Dear players!
We are super happy to announce that we are about to release a new version of our game ready to be playtested!
The demo will be live from February 3rd until the 13th. We're sending the keys & instructions manually so it might take some time to receive a key but we'll make sure to include as many players as possible.
We really want to hear your thoughts about any aspects of the game (likes & dislikes, ideas for improvement) so feel free to share your feedback on our steam forum or on Discord: https://discord.gg/vsxD6n8P8J
For bug reports, please take screenshots and be as precise as possible so we can reproduce them and fix them!
- Great Houses of Calderia Team -
Firesquid 2022 retrospective
This article is a recap of what happened in 2022 for us at Firesquid, a young publisher of strategy games. Read about our exciting year!
We are an indie publisher focusing on games that include strategizing and thinking. Whether it is a grand strategy game, a city-builder, or any other game where the brain is the most important muscle. Our goal is to empower diverse teams and offer players games that make their eyes shine.
What happened in 2022?
We started the year with the announcement of our first game Great Houses of Calderia, a modern generational Grand Strategy game set in the fantastic land of Calderia inspired by the Renaissance.
We received a warm welcome from the strategy game community, especially on Twitter. Players seemed to be intrigued by the Crusader Kings III and Game of Thrones mix and joined our Discord server. We organized a few playtest sessions with our community in the following months. Players shared insightful feedback and we carefully listened.
In June, the game was selected and showcased at the PC Gaming Show in front of thousands of viewers with an exclusive gameplay trailer.
The day after was the beginning of the Steam Next Fest, where the game was showcased. We shared a new demo and had two live streams by the developers at Resistance Games. The reception was good and gained us thousands of wishlists.
In the Summer, Léa and Igor joined us as game testers for an internship where they could learn QA testing, and work on all our games. Thanks to their hard work and passion, they helped the teams tremendously.
At the same time, we were working on another big project: TactiCon. TactiCon is a love letter to strategy games of all kinds. With our partners Hooded Horse, we wanted to celebrate this genre that’s so close to our hearts.
TactiCon is a five-day Steam festival showcasing a carefully curated list of exciting upcoming and recently released or updated strategy and tactics games across a number of different subgenres (grand strategy, 4X, RTS, turn-based tactics, and similar). It also features a series of unique talks, panels, interviews, and let’s plays given by experts from the genre in addition to showcasing the games themselves in a dedicated sale. The event is covered by streamers and the media alike and hosted as a weekend sale on Steam.
In total, 116 games were featured with 48 demos, and 58 games on sale. Two dozen speakers took part in 9 panels around strategy games, with the videos available on Youtube. The Steam page received +2.1M unique impressions and +1.5M unique visitors and a significant wishlists (among 62 respondents) and sales boost for the games participating.
In parallel, to take advantage of the TactiCon momentum, we announced our second game, USC: Counterforce. USC is a turn-based squad tactics game inspired by XCOM, Space Hulk and Aliens, featuring in-depth skill & combat systems and multiple game modes. The game invites you to discover the truth behind the demise of colony MC83-A, and to protect Humankind from an ancient alien threat.
We ran a first playtest session on the demo and new tutorial that was really promising. The developers, Angry Cat Studios, and us are eager to add new features and modes to the game. The community members will be able to test new exciting features in advance of its release.
We then prepared for December’s TurnBasedFest, a Steam strategy game event created by the turn-based community. USC: Counterforce participated with a demo including a new tutorial, new missions, and major visual changes.
We’ve been attending many events in 2022: Game Camp (Lille), Gamescom (Cologne), EGX Live (London), Game Connection (Paris). We plan of going to a few more in 2023, starting with the Game Developer Conference in March (San Francisco). We’d love to meet you there and listen to your pitch!
2023 is going to be very promising for us as a publisher. We will release our first games Great Houses of Calderia and USC: Counterforce, announce new partnerships, hopefully, have the second edition of TactiCon, and more!
Firesquid 2022 retrospective
This article is a recap of what happened in 2022 for us at Firesquid, a young publisher of strategy games. Read about our exciting year!
We are an indie publisher focusing on games that include strategizing and thinking. Whether it is a grand strategy game, a city-builder, or any other game where the brain is the most important muscle. Our goal is to empower diverse teams and offer players games that make their eyes shine.
What happened in 2022?
We started the year with the announcement of our first game Great Houses of Calderia, a modern generational Grand Strategy game set in the fantastic land of Calderia inspired by the Renaissance.
We received a warm welcome from the strategy game community, especially on Twitter. Players seemed to be intrigued by the Crusader Kings III and Game of Thrones mix and joined our Discord server. We organized a few playtest sessions with our community in the following months. Players shared insightful feedback and we carefully listened.
In June, the game was selected and showcased at the PC Gaming Show in front of thousands of viewers with an exclusive gameplay trailer.
The day after was the beginning of the Steam Next Fest, where the game was showcased. We shared a new demo and had two live streams by the developers at Resistance Games. The reception was good and gained us thousands of wishlists.
In the Summer, Léa and Igor joined us as game testers for an internship where they could learn QA testing, and work on all our games. Thanks to their hard work and passion, they helped the teams tremendously.
At the same time, we were working on another big project: TactiCon. TactiCon is a love letter to strategy games of all kinds. With our partners Hooded Horse, we wanted to celebrate this genre that’s so close to our hearts.
TactiCon is a five-day Steam festival showcasing a carefully curated list of exciting upcoming and recently released or updated strategy and tactics games across a number of different subgenres (grand strategy, 4X, RTS, turn-based tactics, and similar). It also features a series of unique talks, panels, interviews, and let’s plays given by experts from the genre in addition to showcasing the games themselves in a dedicated sale. The event is covered by streamers and the media alike and hosted as a weekend sale on Steam.
https://store.steampowered.com/sale/TactiCon
In total, 116 games were featured with 48 demos, and 58 games on sale. Two dozen speakers took part in 9 panels around strategy games, with the videos available on Youtube. The Steam page received +2.1M unique impressions and +1.5M unique visitors and a significant wishlists (among 62 respondents) and sales boost for the games participating.
In parallel, to take advantage of the TactiCon momentum, we announced our second game, USC: Counterforce. USC is a turn-based squad tactics game inspired by XCOM, Space Hulk and Aliens, featuring in-depth skill & combat systems and multiple game modes. The game invites you to discover the truth behind the demise of colony MC83-A, and to protect Humankind from an ancient alien threat.
We ran a first playtest session on the demo and new tutorial that was really promising. The developers, Angry Cat Studios, and us are eager to add new features and modes to the game. The community members will be able to test new exciting features in advance of its release.
We then prepared for December’s TurnBasedFest, a Steam strategy game event created by the turn-based community. USC: Counterforce participated with a demo including a new tutorial, new missions, and major visual changes.
We’ve been attending many events in 2022: Game Camp (Lille), Gamescom (Cologne), EGX Live (London), Game Connection (Paris). We plan of going to a few more in 2023, starting with the Game Developer Conference in March (San Francisco). We’d love to meet you there and listen to your pitch!
2023 is going to be very promising for us as a publisher. We will release our first games Great Houses of Calderia and USC: Counterforce, announce new partnerships, hopefully, have the second edition of TactiCon, and more!
Diplomacy: wards, squires & court members
Oy strategic Lord!
In today's news, the Game Designer Antti will explain the vision behind the diplomacy in Great Houses of Calderia, especially being wards, squires, or court members.
A savvy ruler knows that sometimes the best diplomacy comes not from words, but from actions. As you navigate the intricate world of alliances and rivalries in the game, one powerful tool at your disposal is the ability to send members of your family as wards, squires, or court members to other rulers as a sign of goodwill.
When a child reaches the age of 5, they are eligible to become a ward. This is a common practice where a young noble is placed under the protection and supervision of a guardian from another fiefdom. The ward will live with their guardian and receive training in various areas, such as literature, etiquette, economic skills, fighting, horsemanship, and courtly manners. Although it may seem harsh to be parted from your child, it is also a tradition expected of all noble families. After all, what better way is there to signify and seal a bond of trust between two families than by giving your own child into their care?
When a child is born in the game, they have a chance to have their skills increased every year until they reach the age of 20. This chance is determined by the child's parents, but if the child becomes a ward, the skills of the guardian are also added to the chance pool. This makes wardship a very beneficial gameplay mechanic. Wards will also write letters home, providing valuable information and acting as "little spies" for your family. Additionally, wardship grants a huge bonus to the diplomatic relations between the two families.
At the age of 10, a ward's time with their guardian ends. However, at this point, they are old enough to become squires. Squireship functions similarly to wardship, but instead of learning a wide range of skills, squires focus on training to become knights. They will serve under another noble as an apprentice, learning the skills and techniques of knighthood. Squires are responsible for caring for their noble's armor and weapons and attending to their horses. The same rules apply as with wards, but only the squire's military skill has an increased chance of improvement.
Finally, we have court members. These are adult members of your family who have been invited to join another family's court. Being a court member involves attending court functions and events, and potentially serving the ruler in some capacity. This grants a significant bonus to intrigue and information. However, it also means accepting that there may be a spy in your midst.
Overall, sending a member of your family to another ruler is a serious and meaningful gesture, but it can have long-term consequences if the relationship sours. Choose wisely and use this tool with caution.
Join our Discord to get involved in the development of Great Houses of Calderia: https://discord.gg/vsxD6n8P8J
- Great Houses of Calderia Team -
Ranks in Great Houses of Calderia
Oy opportunists,
Rising in the Ranks of Calderia
We’ve used that phrase on several occasions and put it even in the trailer as a slogan. But what does that mean exactly? Well as it happens, it means two things.
For most strategy games there is a big discrepancy between the early game and late game on the amount of things to manage. That you start off with few resources and few things to do, but in the late game you’re very busy handling all the matters at hand. For us strategy game developers, this is one of the key elements we ponder early on – how do we design the inner workings of a game so that it wouldn’t end up feeling like micromanagement or overwhelming at the end while at the same time making sure there’s enough to do in the early game. So early on, we made a decision that I think was quite bold. There are no full-scale enemies in Calderia. No one who would belong to another kingdom or empire. Your enemies are part of the same empire as you are. And that you only control one fiefdom, one city. This allows us to make the player's home castle a bigger, more important part of the game. But how would you get a sense of progression, and power increasing, if you cannot do the usual ‘map painting’ by conquering other regions?
Feudal Level & Honorary Titles
In Great Houses of Calderia, you try to rise from low nobility to royalty by gaining claims on higher titles and then besting them on the battlefields. But when the nobility levels rely just on 4 steps, barons, counts, dukes, and viceroys – then it is clear that jumping from one of these levels to another is a major step and occurs rarely. How else can you rise in the ranks of Calderia then?
Ranks of Calderia are sets of honorary titles varying in levels of importance. Those who have watched their Game of Thrones or are familiar with feudal societies – these mean the “hands of the king”, “cupbearers” and so forth. However, in the world of Calderia, these temporary titles are family related. So the question is which family holds each rank in the council. These ranks are appointed by the Emperor himself instead of the viceroy and when the Emperor does not live in the Calderia, it is challenging to influence his decisions alone. For that, you need to put out a good word.
Why should you care & how to get one?
Each rank has three major things to consider. The effect is of course the main motivation – what do I get out of it if I am selected? Holding these ranks will grant you all sorts of bonuses and benefits from special units to special abilities and beyond. The second thing is what gives you the “score” to compete with it. If the rank you’re aiming for is clearly militaristic, like wanting to become the Fist of the Empire, then you gain score (or power as we call it) from all sorts of militaristic decisions. From your militaristic buildings to battles won and wars declared. Always the personal abilities of your head of the family also matter. So basically in the semi-short range of gameplay, it helps if you plan ahead. Certain playstyle makes it easier to gain certain ranks. But the same is true for the opposite. Certain rank makes certain playstyle more beneficial. So perhaps a big push you want to make is best done after you’ve won a specific rank first.
The third, but in no way the least impactful element about the ranks, is how it ties into diplomacy. As it is the Emperor who grants the title - and Emperor comes for a visit to the Calderia for the ranks selection – then you want to be known as something. But personal reputation, the news of your deeds is just one thing. You could try to influence others to put out the good word for you. The higher their rank, the more influence their opinion might have on the emperor. But of course, the others who are aiming for the same rank as you are will be doing the same thing. Resulting in relations to key families playing a major role in how likely you are to get the honorary rank you were aiming for. And if you aim too high you’ll have more powerful families aiming for the very same rank.
To sum things up, Ranks of Calderia is one way to dictate who is who in the realm. To compete and see who stands as a more important family in the eyes of the Emperor and boost backstabbing and flattering of other families. At the same time, you can either use it to boost your playstyle or use certain ranks as stepping stones to climbing up on the feudal levels of Calderia.
Join our Discord to get involved in the development of Great Houses of Calderia: https://discord.gg/vsxD6n8P8J
- Great Houses of Calderia Team -
Trade in Great Houses of Calderia
Oy traders!
Today, we're introducing an important topic in Great Houses of Calderia: Trade. Trading will be a central element in the game, discover everything about it in the following points.
Reinventing Trade
Trade trade trade... exchange of goods. Changing one resource to another with other factions in a game. Trade often is the necessary evil in games. Something that needs to be there but isn’t at the core of the experience and therefore is done with very little inspiration. For the sake of the game’s economical balance or to block players from being stuck; to allow players to get access to something their choices otherwise wouldn’t allow, it needs to be there. But rarely trade is anything more than a brief click to get back to the main thing. A mathematical problem where you basically just teleport your resources to the other player or to an arbitrary “market” with a price loss so that it is more beneficial to produce stuff yourself, at least in the long run. If there is interaction with the AI players, there is a clear-cut line where you get the maximum deal from that specific AI, the search for that optimal point does not entail anything more than that. Just a decision is it a yes or a no? So in the worst-case scenario, it is tedious to search for that optimal point by changing the price tag one click at a time.
For Great Houses of Calderia, trade, like other elements need to entangle, to tie into other game mechanics to create an interesting mix. Therefore it was clear from the beginning that trade must be more than just the exchange of goods. It needs to tie in with how players play. Why they choose certain buildings to be built, why they want to improve relations with specific families, and how they could ruin their rivals' businesses. But to understand how trade will become a major part of the politics of Calderia, let’s start looking at how we deal with the most obvious situation – the initialization of trade talks.
Other families decisions
One thing players will be quick to realize is that in Great Houses of Calderia there are multiple things at play when it comes to trade. Valuation of the items is based on supply and demand like they should and there isn’t anything special about that. However, what is more revealing is the other main element on top of valuating the price of the goods – the Willingness meter. Willingness meter shows how happy the other family is about the deal on the table. It combines all the elements what makes the opponent happier or unhappier with the deal and valuation of items is just one part of it. Families that like each other are more willing to trade with one another and if there is a crucial need for resources then the willingness is higher.
Willingness meter is also a reflection of potential outcomes of the trade proposal. If the willingness is at the center, probably the resource exchange is all there is. But if you propose a trade deal with high willingness – you know you’re probably going to get other benefits in the process. If the opponent is about to build an upgrade and therefore needs the associated resource and you’re willing to give that – the willingness is going to go higher and probably an extra outcome is improved relations. If you’re proposing a trade with low willingness, you might not get a deal and if you do that might come with extra strain on the relations also. So we wish this to transform the trade into something more than just exchange of goods – into exchange of partnership as well.
In Great Houses of Calderia, nothing teleports in the game. Transferring large amounts of resources from one part of the map to another doesn’t just happen – it takes time. So most trades that families initiate are actually trade routes that run their course, going back and forth. And when there are caravans going around the map – that opens space for good old Intrigue. Attacking other families caravans is one way to gain resources that wouldn’t belong to you otherwise. But if one is particularly successful in those attempts, they might cause a strain in the relations of the associated trading partners when goods did not get delivered. After EA launch we hope to push this even further and help these types of attacks also impact the relations of the fiefdom owner, where the attack took place.
Not so mercantile society
Part of the design goals of our game is that we don’t want the game to be a “multiplayer solitaire” like many grand strategies often are. This means that player would be mainly just dealing with his own realm and would only deal with other factions via warfare. We want dealing with other families to be a meaningful and constant part of the gameplay and trade also has a role to play there. For that we are trying to balance the in-game economy – as well as AI behavior – to favor situations where it is better to provide a surplus of some resources and trade in the resources one lacks. When this is the optimal way to play, grow and gain influence, it means your growth is dependent on other families as well. And if that is the case – then diplomacy has a bigger space to operate as well. Angering others would reduce their willingness to trade and therefore you would be forced to produce your own resources. But when that is clearly an inferior strategy – then you would have to swallow your pride and try to make relationships better with at least selected families. But we don’t want a trade to just impact your own diplomacy, it should influence your scheming as well.
Bigger than the sum of its parts
With grand strategies that operate as “system soup”, or different mechanics bumping into each other, being impacted by each other and influencing the overall balance, these are all not easy tasks. How impactful trade, or some other part, plays is a result of balancing work of the other elements as well. While trade is nowhere near the most important part where we use our Conflict resolution model – it is easy to showcase how we want players to play-through the most important moments in the game. Same is with trade – that those tricky moments when haggling might go one way or the other – we want to let the player and his family have the final say. This final say is in the social conflicts which we of course use for many other elements as well. There, the player uses their family members and companions to debate the trade deal to a favorable outcome.
Trade... trade is a perfect example, for us, how we want to integrate different systems to operate with each other. How you deal with your own fiefdom, what you build, and what you produce should be impacted by trade opportunities. How you deal with other families should be part of who you want to befriend and who is fine left with less attention. And trade, like other systems, should be part of the conflict resolution model we use.
Join our Discord to get involved in the development of Great Houses of Calderia: https://discord.gg/vsxD6n8P8J
