The Altaz Mariners

The Altaz Mariners is a user-made campaign by jb and Bob_The_Mighty. It is a two-player campaign with non-linear progression, meaning the player is partially-free to play the campaign in the order they prefer, and RPG elements. The campaign takes place in an original setting where most of the world are the sea and the player controls two mariners named Largo and Hugo as they travel from island to island in search of revenge against their older brother Marco.

• Current campaign version: 3.6.0
• Available in add-ons servers: 1.8 (v1), 1.10 (v2), 1.14 (v3), 1.16 (v3), 1.18 (v3)
• Available translations: French

Gameplay

The player control two sides during the whole campaign, one led by Largo (side 1, red) and one by Hugo (side 2, blue). While recruiting, recalling, and upkeep work like in normal Wesnoth, the player's sides can't use standard village-based income and must collect gold through completing quests, finding loot, and selling loot. The campaign has RPG elements in form of a quest log, an inventory for quest items, conversations with adjacent NPCs, and heavy uses of dialogue-tree choice to decide how the gameplay would go.

The campaign consists of the "World Map" scenario which serves as a hub where the player controls the mariners' ship to travel from island to island, and all the other scenarios which follow a more typical Wesnoth format where the player controls their leaders and recruits/recalls to move and fight. These scenarios can be accessed by visiting an island in a hub or through a random encounter on the sea. Island names are labeled green, yellow, orange, and red, ordered by how difficult the island's scenario is (green is near-unloseable, red is a heavy battle).

After the first battle scenario, there is not set order on which island has to be visited first, although terrains such as deep water (when the player hasn't bought a better boat) and the storm in the south prevent some islands to be visited until the player is ready, and some choices may change the effect of visiting an island. Some islands are mutually exclusive and are set on the campaign's start, meaning the player needs to restart the entire campaign to get a different island.

Player's ship

Player traverses through the "World Map" (and a few other select scenarios) by controlling a ship unit. There are multiple ships that can be acquired and the ship type dictates not only the usual unit stats (movement, attacks), but also its cargo capacity and its size in hex (for random encounters). The available ship types are cutter, dhow, caravel, frigate, and galleon.

Cargo

Cargo in The Altaz Mariners consists of rum, jewels, and spices. The player's ship can carry a maximum amount of cargo (depending on the ship's type). Cargo can be found in maps and certain Trading Posts, and can be sold for gold in Trading Posts or to complete quests and trainings. The cost of buying a unit of cargo is usually 10 gold, but its price when sold depends on the Trading Post (the price increases the further the post is from the post that sells the cargo):

• "Dahazi Beach": 30 gold for rum, 29 gold for jewels, 5 gold for spices; sell spices
• "Fort Bastille": 33 gold for rum, 34 gold for jewels, 14 gold for spices
• "Greystone Port": 16 gold for rum, 18 gold for jewels, 31 gold for spices
• "Port Rutt": 25 gold for rum, 26 gold for jewels, 14 gold for spices
• "Reef Town"/"Thurh Gar": 23 gold for rum, 5 gold for jewels, 29 gold for spices; sell jewels
• "Griply"/"Newhart": 5 gold for rum, 23 gold for jewels, 30 gold for spices; sell rum

Scenarios

Prologue

• "The Altaz Mariners"
• "Formative Years"

Hub

• "World Map"

Islands

Islands listed together with a slash between them are mutually exclusive.

Act I

Islands that can be visited with the initial cutter (which can't cross deep water in the world map).

• "Altaz Gaol" (first island)
• "Dahazi Beach"
• "Elixion"
• "Farmville"
• "Hideout"
• "Judro Pits"
• "Port Rutt"

Act II

Islands that can be visited after the player buys a dhow to cross deep water, but before the storm barrier can be crossed.

• "Black Rock"
• "Blade Point"
  • "Black Blade Cavern"
• "Farrow"
• "Fort Bastille"
• "Greystone Port"
• "Griply"/"Newhart"
• "Hellenia"/"Isle of Neafsey"
• "The Ivory Tower"
• "Lludwyn"
• "Morteau"
• "Peoria Ruins"
• "Reef Town"/"Thurh Gar"
• "Royal Palace"
• "Slavenia"
• "Temple of Ice"
• "Thantos Jungle"

Act III

Islands that can be visited after crossing the storm barrier.

• "Avalon"
• "Fire Abbey"
• "Fort Liberty"/"Fort Liberty Sewers" (final island)
  • "The Coastal Battery"/"The Crossing"
  • "Throne Room"
• "Lantos"
• "Solant"
• "Tomb"

Sea encounters

Scenarios that may happen due to random encounters that the player's ship encounters in "World Map".

• "Abandoned Ship"
• "Deep Inside"
• "Goblin Mutiny"
• "Floating Library"
• "Pirate Raid"
• "Orc Ship"

Epilogue

• "Victory Celebrations"

Characters

Player characters

• Largo: Leader of side 1. A modified version of Thug. Brother of Hugo and Margo who seeks revenge towards the latter.
• Hugo: Leader of side 2. A modified version of Poacher. Brother of Largo and Margo who seeks revenge towards the latter.

Followers

Followers are loyal units automatically recalled in most scenarios.

• Bighorn: An Orcish Warlord found in "Slavenia". Requires 250 gold to recruit.
• Kashmir: A Swordsman found in "Lludwyn". Automatically becomes the player's unit before the battle starts.
• Nippy: Originally a Dark Adept in "Temple of Ice" who depending on the player's choices may end up in "Greystone Port". Defeating and sparing him makes him become a follower.
• Ordon and Mocco: A pair of Young Ogres who joins around the start of "Altaz Gaol". They leave the party after the player purchases a dhow.
• Ratty:
• Sayer: A Ghoul found in "Morteau" whom Dr. Morteau wants to destroy. Joins the party if the player sides with him over Morteau and blows up Morteau's house of pain.
• Steven:A Ruffian found in "Greystone Port". Joins if the player talks to him after agreeing to find his father and doing so in "Lantos".

Royals

• King Tylon: King of the royals.
• Baron Lothar: Leader of the royals-aligned faction in "Farrow".

Rebels

Renaldo's faction

• Renaldo: A noble of Farrow with an ambition to overthrow the royals.

Black Blade

• Deliana: Leader of the Black Blade
• Crow
• Raven
• Percival

Sailors

• Marco: Largo and Hugo's brother who betrayed them at the start of the story. The mariners' main goal is to find him and seek revenge.
• Hilldon: The mariners' former first mate. Pursuing him for his betrayal by inaction is one of the mariners' secondary goals.
• Yezza

Others

Elixion

• Athena: The leader of the Elixion elves and woses who speaks in rhymes.

Port Rutt

• Moira

Slavenia

• Pitto: The leader of the Slavenia orcs. Can train leaders or followers the leadership ability for three barrels of rum.

Serpent

• Sea serpent: A sea serpent terrorizing the waters south of Elixion.
• Athens: A guy stuck in the serpent's digestive system.

Storyline

Three brothers--Largo, Hugo, and Marco--have been traveling the seas as pirates since they are young, causing enough trouble that King Tylon puts a bounty on them. Marco decides to sell out his two brothers for a prize, leaving Largo and Hugo to rot in Altaz Gaol where they build up anger and desire for vengeance against their brother.

After a year of imprisonment, Largo and Hugo manage to break free of the gaol by convincing their ogre guards to turn against their bad boss. Now free men again, the brothers amass better ship, gold, and troops in their vengeance quest, but the way to the south where Marco is is blocked by a storm. Using an orb acquired from the Brotherhood of Ice, the brothers reach the south of the map.

However, it turns out that the islands in the south is being invaded by drakes, which has led Marco to align himself with the elves of Avalon as they are all have been doomed by King Tylon who has the Brotherhood of Ice create the storm so that the drakes can't go north, leaving Marco and the elves to die. Largo and Hugo agree to put their revenge aside and help the elves take down the storm by assassinating the Brotherhood's leader Frozenheart, but they are captured by the royals. Marco sells the brothers out again to save his own skin, but the brothers survive the royals' attempt to throw them to the nagas and find their way back to Avalon.

Largo, Hugo, and the elves of Avalon agree that they need to take King Tylon down. With the help of allies they gather during the adventure, Largo and Hugo coordinate the assault of Fort Liberty where the king is, personally killing him and getting revenge on the imprisoned Marco along the way. As a new government is installed to replace Tylon, the brothers slip away satisfied, although the drake danger still looms.

Due to the nature of the campaign, the above synopsis only covers the guaranteed storyline that reaches the final victory. The details of the story and optional subplots can be found depending on the campaign's initial setting and the player's dialogue and scenario choices.

Credits

Authors

• jb: Concept and Story, Map Making and Battle Balancing, Narration and Music
• Bob_The_Mighty: Concept and Story, Coding and Dialogue

Others

• Bear: Potraits
• AnnieSpambot: Playtesting
• Blarumyrran; Playtesting
• mikeanthony: Playtesting
• DarkHorse: Playtesting
• vghetto: Playtesting

See also

• Forum link