Seven Kingdoms II: The Fryhtan Wars

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Seven Kingdoms II: The Fryhtan Wars

Developer(s)	Enlight
Publisher(s)	Ubisoft
Designer(s)	Trevor Chan
Release date(s)	July 1999
Genre(s)	Real-time Strategy
Mode(s)	Single player, Multiplayer
Platform(s)	Windows

Seven Kingdoms II: The Fryhtan Wars is a history-fantasy real-time strategy computer game developed by Enlight, released in 1999. Seven Kingdoms II is the sequel to the original Seven Kingdoms game and its expansion Pack Seven Kingdoms: Ancient Adversaries.

1 Gameplay
2 Civilizations
3 Unit Skills
4 Special Attacks
5 External links

[edit] Gameplay

Fryhtan Wars retain a great deal of concepts from its predecessors that distinguished it from other strategy games. As was in the original, players must manage the population of their kingdoms and the loyalty of subjects while sending armies against enemy kingdoms. The kingdom's population must be balanced among workers who run factories and conduct technological research, peasants who produce food, and soldiers. Each unit and town is given a loyalty rating that must be maintained. Units with low loyalties may betray the kingdom and disloyal towns may rebel. As was in the predecessors, the concept of espionage is a major factor in the game. Players can send spies into enemy kingdoms to steal technology, cause disloyalty and even assassinate enemy leaders. (Generals and Kings)

Fryhtan Wars also introduces several new gameplay elements. The amount of units and structures was greatly increased. For example, each human civilization now has three distinct units: civilian, infantry, and a special military unit (such as cavalry). Artifacts, which gives advantages to the bearer, can be found on the map or purchased from the Inn. In addition, there are heroes, units with high leadership or combat skills that can either be hired or attained when a hero decides to join the kingdom. Perhaps the greatest addition in Fryhtan Wars is the Fryhtans, fantasy-like beasts whose civilization are often at odds against the humans.

Both single player and multiplayer modes are available. The single player mode includes "random map" skirmishes, built-in scenarios, and a campaign game, which consists of a string of dynamically-generated scenarios.

[edit] Civilizations

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Seven Kingdoms II includes 12 human civilizations and 7 Fryhtan species. Besides unique military units with slightly varying attributes, human kingdoms also have unique gods with special powers that the kingdom may evoke from "seats of powers" that also grant unique bonuses. Differences among the three "basic" unit types, the bonuses associated with each particular Seat of Power, and the Greater Begins that may be evoked distinguish the different nationalities. In addition to basic human units, human civilizations can also build a variety of siege weapons, including cannons, ballistae, and catapults. These siege units do not possess a combat score, hence they all carry the same effectiveness from the moment they are created and them moment they are destroyed. But, Siege weapons cost more to maintain and create.

Human kingdoms focus on population, diplomacy and economy, whereas Fryhtan kingdoms (known as Kwyzans) focus directly on military units backed by a very simplistic economy, with almost no diplomatic options and with no espionage. Compared to humans who can build a plethora of structures, including mines, factories, forts, camps and war factories, most Fryhtan species can only build two structures: the lair which breeds more Fryhtans and an additional structure associated with the unique capabilities of the species. Fryhtan kingdoms rely on enslaving human towns, which provide them gold, and killing units, which provides "life force" necessary to breed more Fryhtans. Human kingdoms often contain multiple nationalities, and likewise Fryhtan kingdoms can also contain multiple species. Kingdoms with significant amounts of both humans and Fryhtans are possible, but difficult, because reputation will cause human townspeople to rebel.

Human civilizations:

Normans: Balanced infantry units with both range and shield capabilities. The Normans may train a mounted "knight" unit and evoke the Archangel, who attacks enemy units on the battlefield with his sword.
Celts: Slow-attacking infantry with a shield and special berserker attack. The Celts may train Druids, with a magical ranged attack and evoke Dagodevas, who attacks enemy units on the battlefield with his great club.
Vikings: Lighter-armored infantry with a special berserker attack. The Vikings may train axe throwers from their special structure and evoke Thor, who attacks enemies with thunder.
Greeks: Very fast-attacking infantry equipped with a shield. The Greeks may train a melee cavalry unit and evoke Athena, who can grant invincibility to your units for a period of time.
Romans: Sword-armed infantry equipped with a shield. The Romans may train a cavalry unit capable of throwing spears and evoke Mars, who can greatly raise the leadership level of your generals.
Carthaginians: Shield-carrying infantry that is also capable of a ranged javelin attack. The Carthaginians may train war elephants and evoke Baal Hammon, who can unleash devastating earthquakes, preferably against the enemy.
Chinese: Strong melee combatants with a mediocre bow attack. The Chinese may train Shaolin monks and evoke the Chi Lin, a mythical beast capable of unleashing fire from its breath.
Japanese: Sword-armed infantry with a special berserker attack. The Japanese may train Ninjas who throw shurikens and evoke the goddess Amaterasu, who is proficient at eliminating enemy spies.
Mongols: Sword-armed infantry with a special berserker attack. The Mongols may train horse archers and evoke Tengri, who can lower the loyalty of enemy units and convert them to your side.
Persians: Infantry proficient at attacking from a range. The Persians may train a spear-armed ranged cavalry unit and evoke Mithra, who allows the player to see inside enemy garrisons.
Indians: Infantry capable of melee and armed with a bow. The Indians may train war elephants mounted with an archer and evoke Hanuman, who can cast tornadoes at the enemy.
Egyptians: Infantry armed with a shield and throwing spear. The Egyptians may train chariot archers and evoke Isis, who can instantly increase the population of the player's towns.

Fryhtan Species:

Kharshuf: Masters of Plants. The Kharshulf are bipedal plant-like beasts that can build stationary "towers" of gigantic acid-spitting plants called Lishores. They come in two varieties, regular and Wilde. Wilde Lishores attack all non-Kharshuf units, while regular Lishors attack when attacked and can be directed by the player.
Bregma: Masters of Insects. The Bregma are the smallest, cheapest, and fastest of Fryhtans. The Bregma can train giant killer bees to swarm the enemy, and Tarmes which are weak but extremely hard to kill termites.
Kerassos: Masters of Animals. The Kerassos are a demonic-looking species of Fryhtans capable of luring animals to help them do their bidding. Experienced warriors may launch bones from their backs against the enemy.
Minotauros: Masters of Alchemy. The Minotauros, inspired by the minotaur, are capable of alchemy that allows them to interchange resource types.
Grokken: Masters of Fortress. The Grokken are gigantic stone-like beings and are the largest and most expensive type of units in the game. Four Grokkens are capable of merging into a mighty fortress. They have no secondary building. Disbanding a Grokken fortress made with four Grokkens sometimes results in a game crash.
Ezpinez: Masters of Weapons. The Ezpinez are skeletal serpentine-shaped Fryhtans carrying large swords and shields. They can manufacture siege weapons similar to those of humans, but with more cost efficiency.
Exovum: Masters of Magic. The Exovum are lizard-like bipeds who can build Mage Tors, capable of freezing units, harming buildings and units (separately), and teleporting a single unit somewhere on the map.

[edit] Unit Skills

Units have three main attributes. Combat, Leadership, and Loyalty.

Combat is a measure of how effective a unit is in combat. Most human units gain new attacks when they reach a certain combat value. Frythan units often take longer to get these better attacks, but overall, Frythans are better fighters.

Leadership is a measure of how good a unit is at leading men. This is Important for Generals (Ordos for Frythans)because when a General with a high leadership score leads troops into battle, the troops get a leadership bonus, making them more effective. Good Leadership also keeps Loyalty scores high.

Loyalty is a measure of how loyal and committed a soldier is. The higher the Loyalty, the better. Units with low loyalty are easier to bribe, and are more likely to defect.

[edit] Special Attacks

There are also other, less well known abilities that warriors can attain. The main reason for this is that a very high level of combat skill is required, thus very few players will encounter them outside of campaign mode. These special attacks are quite powerful, and usually involve a combat skill of 150 or above. The effect itself varies with each nationality, but they are strong enough that they can actually turn the tide of battle. For example, the Egyptian chariot super-special triggers an arrow shower that will launch in a 120 degree angle. That coupled with the cold staff, has the potential of freezing multiple enemies in place. Another special is the Celtic warrior fire slice. The special attack involves a shockwave in a 6-square radius. A successful attack will freeze everything around the unit for 15 seconds, which can be devastating for the opposing army.

Although untested, most super-special attacks trigger more frequently at combat levels above 200 and 300. It should be noted that regular units are incapable of reaching these numbers, and Heroes starting with less than 150 will likely not go beyond 200, regardless of how much fighting they do.

Frythans do not have these special attacks, and in the higher campaign difficulty level, it is often a requirement to hire these type of Heroes early on in order to complete the game.