Kalran: Tales of the four nations

"He or she will controls the world, commands the ages. He or she commands the world, conquers the ages..."

-An excerpt of a unknown deity of Kalran. Rumoured to either be its creator or the twins.

Kalran: Tales of the four nations is an science fantasy rts made by ssbob90 with additional contributions by Skyrish19. Set in the planet Kalran it follows the stories of four continents in the eighth age.

Background
Our story takes place on Kalran, a planet with three moons and two suns, and four continents.

To the north lays Arkalion, a nation where the shadow of war looms, with hordes of demon and daemons in the south only contained by the citadel city of Byzalem.

To the west lays Alcradia, a pangaea split apart by the fall of the old Tuatha empire, with the east being a frontier, where monsters, beast, and demons roam, and beneath that wasteland are the Reclaimers, who desires to reforge the world through blood and ash with only the Aegis Defense Force task force slowing them.

To the east lays Axio, an archipelagos where the north is under the rule of the ouroboros goverment, but in the south comes rumor's of a resistance call the Tenkos.

And to the south comes Askrian, a great desert where few truly safe havens exist, each guarded by magical pillars, with nearly the whole desert inhabited by wandering demons and the Cult of Asura, who are hellbent on covering the world in bile, with the Reclamation guilds working to make new havens and stop the cult.

In each nations magic exist in arcane, using chi, and divine, using mana, that uses the four elements, earth, wind, fire, and water, and four races, in each nation, known as the firstborn, blessed by one of the elements.

Gameplay
In Kalran: Tales of the four nations is a science-fantasy rts, a fusion of command and conquer, company of heroes, 8-bit armies/horde/invaders, dawn of war 1/2/3, ground control, starcraft 1/2, warcraft 1/2/3, and act of aggression/war with elements from Age of empires, anomaly: warzone earth, supreme commander, and kingdom rush. in that the player must invade a territory, construct a defensive base, acquire resources, build various combat, defensive and support units, and defeat enemies and take control the territory by and defend the territory from the enemy invaders. Various unit types can be trained, ranging from infantry to vehicles, aircraft and naval vessels. The player may control a total of 24 factions, six in each continent, each with five unique commanders, a total of 120 sub-commanders, each side has its unique characteristics and abilities.

Base building is depended on the faction you play as (The waterborn uses an base building mechanics through a builder unit similar to the one in Command & Conquer: Generals and the earthborn uses a Construction Yard like those from Command & Conquer: Red Alert 2 and Tiberian Dawn)

There are to be multiple resources each faction relies on to sustain their game economies and to build up their forces: deposits of supplies, fuel, and minerals are scattered across the map, and requires scout units to find. Banks and prisoners of war can be captured for a supplementary source of income, and in some cases power up a protocol.

Commanders
Similar to c&c generals, Kane's wrath, and company of heroes. At the start of a round the player must pick one of five commanders of their faction, each providing a passive and active ability, two tech trees, exclusive units and protocols, and, most of all, their epic unit.

Said commanders are simplified into:


 * Classic (exaggerator): focus on enhancing their faction strength
 * Airforce (cannons): focus on fast using airforce to to attack or empower ground forces
 * Defense (balanced): focus on defense and siege
 * Infantry (subversive): focus on infantry and unorthodox tactics
 * Armor (powerhouse): focus on armor assault and straight on attack
 * Naval: Introduced in The Clash at Sea DLC. These commanders focuses on naval and amphibious units/assaults

Controls
See here

Morale
Infantry have a secondary health, called morale, which takes damage when they suffers heavy damage in short amount of time, heavy suppression, heavy artillery, or terror weapon like toxins and fire. And will suffer heavy debuffs to their damage, range, and suppression resistance but increase speed and defense once it's depleted. And if infantry morale stays deplete for too long, or suffer heavy morale damage like a bombardment, most will retreat off the map, the equivalent of the squad dying.

POW
Once the appropriate upgrade is researched all basic infantry, and possibly other infantry, will now have a chance for their attacks to now cause the targeted infantry to surrender, or enter stasis mode in the case of androids and undead, instead of dying, with exception to the Horde, Reclaimers, Ouroboros, and Asura which instead knocks the infantry unconscious, after which they can be apprehended to power a special protocol or ability.

Suppression and pinned
When medium infantry are hit by a heavy machine gun, rapid artillery bombardment, or a sniper, they will go into a suppressed state. Lowering their speed but briefly increases their defense, especially if in cover. Followed by taking low but constant morale damage, and heavily reduced rate of fire and damage.

And if a light infantry gets suppressed or a medium infantry stays suppressed for a too long they will become pinned, fully immobilizing said infantry and briefly grant a large buff to defense but will take more damage afterwards and can't attack.

Heavy and superheavy infantry are immune to suppression effect. But heavy infantry will take more damage and are slowed down, with superheavy speed slowed to the point of being pinned, while heavy artillery strikes will stun them.

Protocol
Protocols are special abilities used by each faction and are split in four forms, national power, tech, structure, and commander.

The first are national power, a powerful protocol that represents the main power of each faction that can easily turn the tide of battle when used but is incredibly expensive, must be researched, and has a long cooldown between use.

The second are tech protocols, a tech tree forming the basic of each factions and useable by all faction commander which are unlocked as the game progresses, each building off their factions playstyle.

The third are structure protocols, which as implied only comes by building a structure and will be lost if said structure falls and provides support powers to aid their forces.

And the last are commander protocols, a combination of the first and second with tech tree which abilities can only be unlocked points earned in battle or a commander exclusive units/structures.

Each protocol are suited for the factions and commanders and can turn the tide of battle, from summoning special units to bombardment powers, that can be upgraded as the game progresses. But each of them have a cooldown and/or cost resources.

Superweapons
Many real-time strategy games employ a superweapon or tactical weapon, a very powerful, near if not limitless range, endgame weapon with large technological requirements and high costs. Popular examples of superweapons are the nuke and iron curtain from Command & Conquer and the nuclear missile from StarCraft.

In Kalran: Tales of the four nations, superweapons or tactical weapons are split between offensive, used to simple destroy the target, and support, built to support their forces and charges faster, can be technologically unlocked at the third or highest tier, and require high costs and amounts of funds.

Damage and armor types
Kalran: Tales of the four nations uses a simple equation with special tags

Tech Buildings
Like with the Command and Conquer games, Kalran: Tales of the Four nations also has neutral tech buildings that can be captured to gain new abilities or units that are not part of the main factions.

Tier system
As the battle goes the commander will have to tech up their bases to unlock more advance units, upgrades, and protocols to beat their opponents.

There are a total of three tiers each factions have a unique method for access to advanced units, structures, or upgrades, depending on their type:

Experience
As the battle goes on experience the commander units will gain experience, passively in small trickles and by their units killing enemies and taking damage. Experience is mainly used to purchase protocol but is also used to upgrade their units into veterans, depending on the faction.

Earthborn (Dwarves, Fenrir, Xiagui, Goliath), ADF, and Ouroboros: Individual units gains a rank as they gain experience, buffing their stats while granting them special bonuses. But ranks are given per individual, meaning its a long process to level every base unit to a veteran, and if a veteran unit dies they take that veterancy with them

Waterborn (Humans), Byzalem, and Asura: Only officer units gains veterancy, and any experience a unit gains will be transferred to the nearest officer. Said officer in turn grants an aura, territorial, or global buff to units and unlocks special passives. But officer units are more expensive then other units and, while produced instantly, are locked behind cooldown. Meaning that its hard to mass multiple officer units

Fireborn (Orcs, Rokhari, Salamander, Mukasura), Guilds, and Horde: Veterancy is purchased through their hq, costing both resources and experience, which is then applied to all new and existing units

Windborn (Elves, Navaheim, Nekomata, Faunus), Tenko, and Reclaimers: Their units can't gain veterency. Instead experience is used to purchase powerful upgrades, which cost a lot of experience but are done instantly, more powerful units, and to unlock and use more powerful protocols

Silly mode
This setting gives units additional dialogues that are either references, memes, and or jokes that breaks immersion. Particularly when clicking a unit multiple times.

Single Player

 * Tutorial - teaches the basic mechanics and summary of commanders
 * Campaign - allows you to complete the stories of each faction.
 * Conquest - Similar to the Total War games and Dawn of War Dark Crusade's Campaign Mode, dominate Kalran.
 * Challenge - similar to those of Command & Conquer: Generals and Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3 - Uprising, you can choose your commander to challenge the each factions five commanders. Ending with the player having to face all five commanders of that faction at once
 * Custom - allows you to play maps that are in either skirmish, or use map settings game mode against computer-assisted opponents.
 * Survival - survival mode has the player either choose a commander before being tasked to hold off waves of ai controlled enemies, either from one faction commander to potentially every commander depending on difficulty.
 * Map Editor - Allows you to create your own maps, with trigger scripts and custom parameters available.

Multiplayer (Note: These modes can also be played alone with AI)

 * Versus - you can fight opponents in 1v1, 2v2, 3v3, 4v4 or FFA cooperatively or singularly.
 * Custom - allows you to play maps that are in either skirmish, or use map settings game mode against computer-assisted or human-assisted opponents.
 * Control point - commanders must take control of one, up to three, control points and wins by either having the most points when the timer ends or wh
 * Naval warfare - commanders are restricted to naval units, instead using AI-controlled ground troops to take islands
 * Tankery - commanders are restricted to vehicles, with AI infantry support and airstrikes
 * Urban combat - commanders are restricted to infantry, but can call in air and artillery support
 * Knights of the skies - commanders are restricted to aircrafts, helping and getting help from AI-controlled infantry and vehicles on the ground
 * King of the hill - commanders must take control of a single area on the map and hold off their opponent until the time pass, and win
 * Minor faction deathmatch - commanders gets to play a minor faction, gaining special protocols and the ability to call additional reinforcements to bulk up their forces, with the objective to destroy their opponent, who also controls a minor faction
 * KalranNet - *TBA*

Remlia Legion:
The Remlia legion is the army of the Remlia Republic, consisting of the Humans and their allies of the Trolls, Lapori, and Nymphs. As a military force they consist of a mixture of numerous recruits, from legionaries to musketmen, and elite veterans, with sharpshooters armed with lever action muskets to their famous dragon knights. Able to handle any foe that comes at them.

Volksgard Expeditionary Group:
Masters of armored warfare and tanks, the Volksgard consist of the Dwarves elite military. Wielding advance technology and earth magic, from diesel powered vehicles and advance gunpowder weaponry, that compensates their lack of research in magic and small numbers. Utilizing brute force and a slow but unstoppable charge, with a variety of powerful and heavily armored tanks, supported by fleets of helicopters, to make one concentrated strike through the enemy defense.

Salkoy Strike Force:
Ruler of cavalry and sky, Salkoy consist of the Elves, the strongest cavalry in all of Kalran, having been the ones who brought equestrians to Arkalion, while ruling the skies with their famous pegasus knights. With advance research in the arcane magic, particularly wind magic, wielding chi powered guns and hover tanks, despite wielding weapons made of glass and stone. In battle they are masters of maneuver warfare and strikes as fast as lightning, their infantry infiltrating and scouting out the enemies weaknesses before their airforce and cavalry deals a devastating blow before escaping to strike at another angle.

Orc War Company:
Rapid and hard hitting. The Orc war company, compromising of volunteers who leaves their tribe to defend their people, using mobile command wagons to summon their forces anywhere. With weapons of mass destruction, superior firepower with their hellfire weaponry and vehicles, frontal assault, fire magic, strength, courage and valor in order to combat their enemies

Byzalem Garrison Forces:
As the only nation stopping the Southern horde from invading the rest of Arkalion. The Garrison forces of Byzalem, consisting of the ten races and Vardskuls, are masters of siege defense able to transforms a barren land into a large fortress, filled with an array of garrison structures, traps, powerful towers and great walls to funnel their foes into designated kill zones for their defense. While using attack-oriented, if short ranged, units to take territory, punishing any foe foolish enough to charge upon their city without planning.

The Southern Hordes:
Masters of besieging. The Southern Hordes consist of small but strong cultist units supported weak but cheap and numerous slave units to break through a defense line and follow through. And in battle the Horde sends out the slaves first to be the breachers for the cultist, tasked with the suicidal mission of charging through towards the enemy defense to break to hole in the line, supported by large but heavily specialized artillery, before protecting the cultist as they make their way towards the breach and slaughter their foes.

United Columbia Alliance Armed Forces:
The United Columbia Alliance Armed Forces, or UCAAF, is an alliance consisting of the Fenrirs and their allies of the Harpies, Skarnops, and Goliaths. Fighting with a combination of adaptable tactics and combined arms with small but elite units that can face any foe in order to defeat its enemies and their tactics. Relying on skill, versatility, and advanced technology to handle anything, at the cost of being a master of none and small numbers.

Kevros Federation Guards:
The Kevros Federation Guards consist of the Humans who survived the hyperion bombardment, thanks to the creation of fallout shelters in the mountains, and protected by an array of defensive turrets to stop their foes. And while the Federations manpower is naturally not as much as the one of the other factions. However to compensate for this, they developed advanced technologies, drones and massive robots to fight for them along with their warriors, who marches into battle with advance mecha suits that straddles the line of infantry and tank. Utilizing advance laser, cryo, and missile based weaponry with tough mechs and waves of droids to stem the tide.

Rokhari Riders:
The Riders consist of the Rokhari fiercest warriors who emphasize penetration warfare. With their units, consisting of a fleet of fast light vehicles and cavalry, coming from their walkers, mobile bases that can become a walking siege or support engine, which allows them to strike anywhere and replenish losses quickly. Armed with plasma, microwave, thermobaric weaponry, and fire magic they can carve through any defenses and strike the vulnerable base within.

Hansion Warband:
The Hansion Warband, consisting of the Navaheims, focuses on divide and conquer. Using elite infantry and mobile airforce to quickly strike, encircle, and swiftly eliminates their foes before they can defens themselves. With their tunnel networks, and tesla based power and weaponry to close the distance before attacking with their full might, where even the toughest foe with crumble to the might of their warriors.

Aegis Defense Force:
The ADF is a force that relies on rapid, precise, strikes at the enemies weakpoint. While each of their units have a build limit, meaning that the commander controls more of an elite strike force rather than an army, they compensates with devastating abilities and powerful upgrades and promotion, with a five star veteran being almost a one man army, and protocols capable of wiping out armies and razing bases, at the cost of being expensive. Using bleeding edge technology, from Faster then light drives, particle accelerated weaponry, to hard light, to defeat their foes.

Reclaimers:
The Reclaimers focuses on victory through attrition and superior firepower. While nowhere near as technologically advanced as the UCA and other technologically superior factions, they rely on apocalyptic manpower through cloning, attrition warfare, chemical warfare, terror tactics, advance but invasive cybernetics and thermal based weaponry, outdated arsenal of military weapons, vehicles, aircraft and vessels, and devastating superweapons to bring victory. No matter how many clones will die for them, either by the enemy or their hands, as the clones are the equivalent of bullets in their eyes. At the cost of having little to no defense.

Kyoira Armed Forces:
The Kyoira Armed Forces is an offense and arcane oriented faction, Consisting of the Nekomatas and their allies the Minotaur, Tengu, and Kitsune. With their army focusing on using numerous, if heavily specialized and individually weak, units to face any foes, with advance wind magic and naval firepower.

Salamander Attack Wing:
From their great airships, a flying fortress capable of transporting a small army, attacks the Salamanders, composing of their fleet of airships ruling the skies while sending down deadly infantry and light vehicles to claim land.

Seujin Royal Army:
The Seujin Royal Army is a defense-oriented and technologically advantaged, at least compared to other Axion factions, favoring defense over offence with use of powerful, static, artillery to pummel their foes before they can reach them, or to weaken their foes with a withering barrage. While their soldier sweeps and kill any survivors that makes it past their defense line.

Sathspor Reavers:
From the great waves comes the Reavers of Sathspor. A offense focused faction whose units, from their standard Raider to their Longboats, are amphibious, allowing their entire army to handle their foe whether on land or sea and strikes anywhere in rapid, devastating, raids before retreating back to their hidden bases, which are either on land or under the sea.

Tenko Rebel Strike Force:
Formed to fight against the Ouroboros regime. The Tenko may be individually weak compared to the organized regime but they make up for it in numbers and versatility. With their workers able to transform into any unit to serve the rebellion.

Ouroboros Peacekeeper Division:
As the reigning superpower of Axio. The Ouroboros Battlegroup uses propaganda tactics to control the battlefield, though many of their power are gatekeep by whether the people supports their action. With a small but elite combat forces, technological superiority, massively destructive weaponry, psychological warfare, and vast number of infantry, vehicles, aircraft and vessels built for counter insurgency. Their deadliest being their peacekeepers, a paramilitary police force that safeguard the nation against dissidents, within and without, and fight against those who oppose the government, while being supported by the penitent legion, which composed of criminals and their families forced into combat suits to fight to atone for their sins, with the empty promise of release for their service.

Malkara Attack Forces:
From the desert the Malkara Attack force consist of the Mukasura and their allies, Gnomes, Kobold, and Potnia. With their army focusing on mobile warfare, with their Gernerals able directly call in units on the field, no matter where they are

Delteroa Self-Defense Forces:
The Delteroa Self-Defense Forces are the soldiers of the normally pacifist Faunus, and masters of guerilla warfare. Using elite stealth infantry and mobile airforce to quickly strike upon their foes weak points before escaping retaliation. Using their masterful control of illusion magic and sonic based weaponry to engage their foes from a distance and retreating before the enemy can find them. Fighting against the Faunus is less of facing them but finding them.

Kuzeru Royal Guards:
Being the tamer of Askrians large fauna and master of summoning creatures of mist. The soldiers of Kuzeru rides into battle upon cavalries of elephants, rocs, and carpet supported by smaller falcons and the djinn, creatures of water created by their elite summoners

Goliath Battlegroup:
From the peaks of the mountains to it's valleys. The Goliaths of Duberth are experts in mechanised warfare, with infantry and IFV working together with armor and artillery support to pound their foes and break even the strongest defense

Reclamation Guilds:
Situated at the edges of the wasteland. The Reclamation Guilds work to remove the blight on their nation and claim new grounds for the people of Askrian, with expeditions groups, composing of veteran leaders aided by hired mercenaries. While their numbers of veteran is limited they are strong and can strengthen the mercenaries they lead.

Cult Of Asura War Caste:
Ruling nearly all of Askrian. The War Caste of Asura are the weapon arm of the Cult. Spreading their tainted poison, known as blight, upon which their structure are built and where their forces are stronger, while any foes stepping into such tainted land will have a hard time navigating. While creating creatures of shadow that terrorize the lands, but their deadliest weapon is the markers, obelisk of Devil magic, that revives the corpses of friend and foe to serve them, and their ability to subvert their foes through mind control, parasites, and fear tactics.

Miscellaneous

 * Cast: The voice actor/actress who voices the units
 * Soundtrack: The music of KTOFN composed

DLC

 * Heroes and Villains: Brings in a special Radio tower that allows the commander to call in special heroes, assassination mode, where the commander must destroy their opponents VIP unit, which can be a specific unit and/or the factions commander to win, and allows each faction to send their commanders into battle. And unlocks eight mini-factions, two in each continents, and their structure which, once captured, allows the commander to call in their mini-factions units, each having a specific role to support the faction. And mini-faction deathmatch, which has the player command a mini-faction, with the goal to defeat their opponents, who also control a mini-faction, with additional reinforcements
 * An age long gone: In this DLC we see the origin of the Horde, Reclaimers, Ouroboros, and Asura. Under the command of William, Desmond, Mercedes, and Latifah. And their slow descend to their villainy in the 8th age, as they succumb to their inner demons and becoming the monster they had swore to destroy, or would it be different this time? This DLC will introduce eight new faction, Stormlands Rebellion and Salhaim Theocracy, United Revolutionaries and Tuatha Empire, Pacific Coalition and Kyodrid Inquisition, and Workers Revolt and Majakalit Aristocracy. With the campaign seeing the Rebellion, Revolutionaries, Coalition, and Revolt rise, but would it fall into the monsters it became like history? Or will they stand firm in their ideals, becoming what they should have? And will Salhaim, Empire, Inquisition, and Aristocracy begin their road to atonement as their foe turns to monsters? Or will they cling onto their toxic ideals?
 * The Clash at Sea: This DLC adds a new sub-commander type, Naval, which focusing the battles at the oceans of Kalran.
 * Enemies from another world: This DLC adds two new faction, The Wild Hunt, an Extra-terrestrial race, known for their love of hunting, from another planet, and the Collective, a sentient mass of bio-robotic goo bent on assimilating every living being into its mass.
 * From the stars: This DLC adds two new faction, The Epsilon Combine, a race of silicon based aliens whose psionics compensates for their absolute lack on any technology and the United federation, space faring Humans, armed with nothing but advance solarpunk technology, who comes from the planet Earth.
 * The broken covenant: This DLC will see the covenant, the laws that forbids the forces of heaven and hell to interact with Kalran, shattered. And with it two new factions come, the forces of heaven and the forces of hell.

Trivia

 * Each of the continents has different technology level.
 * Arkalion is Napoleonic/wild west era and based off Europe
 * Alcradia ww2/cold war era and based off north Americas and eastern Europe
 * Axio stone age/age of sails era and based off Asia
 * Askrian bronze age/renaissance era and based off the middle east, south Americas, and Oceania
 * Each of the four elemental races are also partially based on a root culture and an RTS style.
 * Earthborn: Pale with ovoid, goat-like, pupils and grey, stone-like scales on parts of their body, based off the the British isle and plays similar to company of heroes
 * Waterborn: Light tan with normal eyes, based off Scandinavia and plays similar to warcraft and starcraft
 * Windborn: Olive with slit, cat-like, pupils and green marking, like tattoos, on their body, based off Asia, particularly japan, and plays similar to dune and command and conquer
 * Fireborn: Black with black sclera and red horns, based off the middle east and plays similar to more mobile factions, like the hierarchy in universe at war
 * Kalran and the setting itself is a fusion of Eberron from dungeons and dragon, Eternia from masters of the universe, the world of Avatar the last airbender, particularly the legend of korra, and Warhammer fantasy.