Dæmon

Created by /u/Bookard-Edu in collaboration with feedback from /r/Polytopia.

Art by /u/Apizku7

Dæmon head

## Design

The design space I wish to take up with the addition of Dæmon is that of a demonic presence in the square. Demonic themes are very diverse in their representation, so it is important to hone-in on a few key themes in order to create a tribe which is easily identifiable and unique. The themes which I would like to delve into are destruction, sacrifice, and summoning.

### Destruction

The destructive aspect of Dæmon would be its unique environmental interaction feature. Dæmon are able to create fires on tiles (3(2?) cost, similarly placed to Roads but only within Dæmon territory) which burn over 3 turns. Players cannot create a Fire tile on an enemy occupied tile, but can create a Fire tile under a friendly unit. Fire tiles cannot be created on cities. Passing over a Fire tile deals damage to enemy units which pass through or land on the tile depending on how many turns the Fire tile has left. Using Engulf creates a fire on the chosen tile (except Water, Ocean, or Ice) and destroys any buildings on that tile except for Roads. Engulf does not require Construction - Destroy (to offset the cost of creating a Fire tile). An example of Fire tile damage could be:

* Turn 1: 6 damage to enemy units which pass through or land on the tile.
* Turn 2: 4 damage to enemy units which pass through or land on the tile.
* Turn 3: 2 damage to enemy units which pass through or land on the tile.
* Turn 4: The fire dies out and the Fire tile disappears, leaving a blank tile.

### Sacrifice

Sacrificial elements of the tribe are taken from the Disband feature. Currently, with all other tribes, Disband removes the unit using the ability and refunds half the cost of the unit rounded down. Disband, in the case of Dæmon, would be replaced by Sacrifice. Sacrifice would allow the unit to remove itself from the game (in the same way that Disband does), except rather than refunding stars, the unit would spawn Imps. Each Imp is worth 1 star. Disbanding (Sacrificing) a Warrior would spawn 1 Imp where the Warrior was Disbanded. Disbanding a Knight would spawn 4 Imps on and around where the Knight was Disbanded. You may not Sacrifice units in Water or Ocean tiles.

### Summoning

Summoning should play a role in unit construction. Dæmon uses Imps as fodder in order to summon more powerful units. This is balanced around losing your own basic units in order to create Imps, and then losing said Imps in order to create the new summoned unit. Units can be summoned with Mind Benders (Acolytes) and the unit summoned depends on the amount of Imps surrounding the Mind Bender in a 3x3 square. There are three possible summons available:

Summoned units can not be sacrificed.

## Technology

The unique technology to Dæmon is a spin on the Philosophy tree. The new tree would look like: Climbing (unchanged) > Occultism (Meditation) > Summoning (Philosophy).

### Occultism

* Mountain Temple is renamed to Sacrificial Altar
* Defense bonus on mountains is unchanged
* Warmonger task instead of Pacifist: Attack for 5 turns in a row to get Altar of War

### Summoning

* Acolyte replaces Mind Bender
* Lieracy is unchanged
* Genius task is unchanged

## Units

### Acolyte

The Acolyte retains the Mind Bender’s ability Convert. Heal is replaced by Summon. Summon would have three versions (this could be reduced to one adaptive ability) depending on the amount of Imps surrounding the Acolyte. The Acolyte should be more powerful offensively than the Mind Bender and should take on a more “wizardly” role. Abilities:

* Summon: Allows the unit to summon additional units by consuming surrounding Imps.
* Convert

Additionally, it has 3 Attack and 2 Range

### Infernal

The Super Unit of the tribe. Similar to the Gaami, the Infernal is surrounded by a fiery aura which damages enemy units in a 3x3 square around the Infernal each time the Infernal moves for a moderate amount of damage. Ability:

* Auto Ignite: Allows units to damage enemies automatically as they move.

### Imp

Special unit created by disbanding other basic units. Imps are worth 1 star each. Disbanding (Sacrificing) a unit will grant an Imp for every 2 stars that Disbanding would have granted the player *(ie., Disbanding a Defender would grant 1 star, granting 1 Imp. Disbanding a Swordsman would grant 2 Imps. Disbanding a Giant (Infernal) would grant 5 Imps)*. Imps cannot be created by disbanding naval units. Imps cannot gain veteran status. Imps have 1 attack, 1 defence, 1 movement, 5 health, and 1 range. Imps cannot be created by cities. Imps cannot become naval units. Imps are used to summon stronger units via Sacrifice. Ability:

* Scurry: This unit can move on the turn it is created.

## Gameplay

Dæmon’s gameplay loop centers around creating extra units to Sacrifice, then using Imps and Acolytes to create more powerful units than are available for other tribes. In addition, since Dæmon would spend quite some time defenseless in order to set up their Acolytes and Imps, they would use extra gold income (which may have been spent on tech in other tribes) to Engulf surrounding tiles to create damaging barriers which would give them the time they need to set up their army.

The endgame of the Dæmon is to summon Ifrit to solidify their position with a large defensive(?)/offensive(?) unit which protects their Acolytes or forward position and overrun the enemy tribes with Ghouls and Revenants.

They do well in open spaces which allow Imps to position favourably around your Acolytes, while an island spawn is highly disadvantageous.