Noblesse Oblige: Legacy of the Sorcerer Kings

[Lord Forte]

Hello! I'm Lord Forte, a solo developer with a passion for turn-based RPGs, and I'm making Noblesse Oblige: Legacy of the Sorcerer Kings!

Game Site

Noblesse Oblige follows the story of Alexander, a young, ardent nobleman who is equal parts idealistic and pragmatic, and his loyal companions as they navigate intrigue, betrayal, and a tempestuous civil war. Yet winning upon the battlefield is but the beginning--to claim a true and lasting victory, Alexander must also prove himself a capable ruler, making decisions that will have a lasting impact on the fate of the realm, and perhaps find love amidst it all... I've always thought the world needs more competent and moral RPG protagonists, personally (a sentiment strongly inspired by the masterpiece that is The Last Sovereign), and this game is my attempt to add to that number,





Noblesse Oblige features an in-depth battle system, a more dynamic take on traditional turn-based combat. Characters have custom passive effects, management of resources, and meaningful skills that mean you should never be stuck spamming basic attacks. Party members' loyalty reflects their view of your choices; loyal allies offer significant benefits in combat, in addition to more story content! The game's major choices will all be carried forward, and even minor choices affect key variables that reflect how well you've ruled the realm.





Noblesse Oblige is made in RPG Maker VX Ace, but I've done very extensive work on creating custom effects, and also on making unique and visually interesting maps, using a wide array of tilesets.








At present, the game is an early access episodic release. Currently, the prologue plus the first seven chapters are fully complete, barring minor adjustments, representing 40+ hours of content. The current public build is v0.13.1.3 "Meetings and Partings," available on the game site, on Steam, or on Itch.io.

The latest version is typically available to supporters on Patreon. My hope is to release major content updates every 2-3 months

As far as sexual content Noblesse Oblige features a significant amount of optional sexual content, currently in the form of text-only sex scenes. To see it, you'll need the adult patch from my site. One day I'd love to add art, but that isn't currently within my budget, haha.



Highlight spoiler to see sexual content types:

Spoiler: View sexual content types

Bondage, BDSM, menage-a-trois, FFM threesome. The sexual content is focused on the three main characters' developing three-way relationship, although there is at least one scene with someone else available, I'm considering adding one other character to the relationship, and future updates may include content between secondary couples. There is also a strong theme of consensual bondage and domination.

Game Trailer:

Game Mechanics Trailer:

 

[Lord Forte]

Noblesse Oblige: Legacy of the Sorcerer Kings v0.9 "A Myrmidon's Honor" has been released to the public! Get it on the game site, on Itch.io, or on Steam!

v0.9.1.2 Patch Notes:

• 68k words of content
• New section of the game and story
• One new combat section
• New optional boss
• Another major story decision (along most paths)
• See the Castle Town begin to transform with story progression!
• Begin commissioning Custom Armor, if the right conditions are met!
• This update will see a lot of past choices come into play, moreso than any previous update
• Sindarion's 50-loyalty skill is available
• Note: Ligaea and Ariadne's 75-loyalty skills are not currently available even if they reach this threshold, pending future story events; similarly, Cynthia's 50-loyalty skill is not yet accessible.

= Balance Changes

• Reduced the damage on Whirlwind, given just how much it was doing as an AoE ability
• Reduced the defense piercing properties of Power Shot from 50% defense piercing to 25% defense piercing. This will mainly be noticeable against high defense enemies
• Corrected a bug with Wracking Poison dealing percentage-based damage
• Alexander's attacks now deal half "piercing" elemental damage to better represent his rapier, and Pierce deals fully Piercing damage. Piercing damage (currently only used in this fashion--other skills referred to as "Piercing" ignore part of the enemy's defense stat) is identical to Physical damage vs ranged enemies, but is not reduced by the physical damage percentage resistance of armored enemies.

= Features

• Added an Autosave feature. An autosave will be made in slot 152 (labeled "Autosave") after any map transition. In the future, I'm hoping to improve the save menu further by adding multiple pages to reduce lag.
• Added a visual-novel style text backlog, accessed by pressing the D key. This feature is experimental, so please report any bugs encountered. In the future, I may add options to set how many messages are stored.
• Allowed audio settings to persist between saves (mainly so that they apply on the title screen). At present, applying the adult patch may disrupt this, but should not break anything. The audio settings are still in the game directory, meaning they won't persist across new updates except in the Steam version. If desired, you can make it work by copying your old Settings.txt to the new install like you do your saves.

= UI Changes
- Reordered the Battle Status menu windows to more easily check effects


= Misc Changes

• Added a new animation for Cloak Spin
• Added a new animation for Searing Wind
• Added one new statue option for castle interior customization
• Backend changes to ensure that proposal descriptions and effects can be dynamically updated as needed
• Various minor improvements to the mapping of the Castle Town
• New map-sized versions of Ligaea's arrow animation for use in cutscenes
• Rewrote the conversation in Chapter 4 between Anselm and Siegfried. In addition, Anselm's epithet is now "Anselm the Unyielding." If you would like to view the changed scene without replaying, I have uploaded a video
• Added some hints toward finding the 5th clue during the Smuggler Hunt quest in Chapter 4, to hopefully make it less frustrating.

= Bugfixes

• Fixed a potential crash when opening the Forging UI for the first time (I hope; this issue was hard to pin down, so if it happens after the patch, please report it).
• Fixed a softlock on the intro to the Elysian Groves that could occur if text was read too quickly. There are probably other places this can happen--let me know if you find any, I have a pretty straightforward solution I can deploy.
• Fixed an issue where the game would become unresponsive on hitting accept with one of the new status menu options selected.

Screenshots:

Spoiler: Expand Screenshots

 

[Lord Forte]

Noblesse Oblige: Legacy of the Sorcerer Kings v10.0 "Fateful Encounters" is available to supporters on Patreon!

You can get it here with patreon access.

v0.10 will be releasing to the public in one month, on February 2nd!

v0.10.0.6 "Fateful Encounters" Features:

• Significant new section of the story
• Many new locations to explore!
• 52k words of text
• New combat sections
• New optional party member available for those who could and chose to recruit him last update
• Some new content I'm very excited for you to discover but won't spoil =P
• Much improved save screen, with much less lag!

 

[Lord Forte]

Noblesse Oblige: Legacy of the Sorcerer Kings v0.10.1.0 "Fateful Encounters" is now available to the public! Get it on Patreon, on the game site, on Steam, or on Itch.io!

• Significant new section of the story
• Many new locations to explore!
• 52k words of text
• New combat sections
• New optional party member available for those who could and chose to recruit him last update
• Some new content I'm very excited for you to discover but won't spoil =P
• You can now tell steam to apply all eligible Steam achievements to a save imported from a non-Steam version from the Temporal Rift or to correct any missing achievements from having been disconnected when they should have been earned.
• Several new Steam achievements related to party members! Note: Since these were not tracked previously, retroactive credit is not possible.

= Balance Changes

• Slightly lowered the damage of Lorena's Frostshard
• Lowered the bonus damage of Lorena and Ariadne's synergy to 3% per stack of Burning/Chilled instead of 5% per stack. Hitting a Frozen enemy with a fire skill is now 30% extra damage rather than 50%.
• Healing items (including Improved Potion) now do 30% more healing when used by Sindarion.

= UI Changes

• New save screen! Now there are 200 save slots, split into 10 pages of 20 slots. This should hopefully mitigate the lag on opening the save menu. The autosave slot is now Slot 200. Please report any issues with this.
• Characters now have different facial expressions in the battle or party UI when below 25% HP.
• Fixed the F12 functionality. Using F12 to reset to the title screen will now properly clear the battle UI and will no longer make Graphical Object crashes more likely to occur. Please report any issues with this.
• Increasesd the height of the help menu in combat and the skills screen by 1 line.

= Bugfixes

• Implemented the defense piercing property on Blitz from Sindarion's 50-loyalty event.
• Fixed a possible softlock after finishing Sindarion and Ligaea's synergy scene in Chapter 8.
• Fixed the loyalty changes for the choices in a petition being reversed (will be retroactively fixed for old saves in the Temporal Rift).
• Fixed the cost of funding both the healers' guild and a sacred grove in Chapter 8 not being correctly subtracted (will be retroactively fixed for old saves in the Temporal Rift).
• Various minor passability fixes to old content.
• Fixed a bug in which Lorena's absolution registered as a physical attack.

= Misc Changes

• Added text informing the player that the Prince's Regalia adds a new skill when equipped.
• Redid the animation for Cloak Spin (again XD) so it looks less like a debuff.
• Reverted Lorena's Howling Cleave to the old animation as it felt more forceful (and the new one seemed to cause issues for those emulating on Macs).
• Properly centered the Sacred map casting animation like the others.
• Made a new golden map casting animation for members of the Order of Alcina and some others.
• Continuing war on typos. XD Many thanks to StormyAngel for very comprehensive reporting, and to everyone else who has reported them!

 

[Lord Forte]

Noblesse Oblige: Legacy of the Sorcerer Kings v0.11 "A King's Legacy" is available to supporters on Patreon!

You can get it here with patreon access!

v0.11 will be releasing to the public in one month, on April 26th!

v0.11 "A King's Legacy" Patch Notes (3-29-2024)​

- Significant new section of the story

- 74k words of text

- Extensive new combat section(s)

- New character art for Alexander! Currently only one expression still, but should have a full range of emotions for the public release!

~ Note: The current expression is not his new default expression, but rather the first one the artist completed.

- One new intimate scene for those with the optional patch

Screenshots​

 

[Lord Forte]

Noblesse Oblige: Legacy of the Sorcerer Kings v0.11.1.3 "A King's Legacy" is now available to the public! Get it on Patreon, on the game site, on Steam, or on Itch.io!

v0.11.1.3 Patch Notes​

- Significant new section of the story

- 74k words of text

- Extensive new combat section(s)



- New title screen for the game!
Art by the very talented Celineyus: https://www.artstation.com/celineysus


- New art for Alexander, including a bust and 32 expressions!
Art by Mimo: https://www.reddit.com/user/Mimo_draw



- New art for Ligaea, including a bust and 6 new expressions! (note: a patch is available here torestore the old look if you dislike the new one).
Art by Zecypher: www.zecypher.com



- Recolored art for Sindarion and Lorena to better match their roles in the story!


- Recolored sprites for Calysia and another member to better match their bust and portrait art!


- Busts added for character introductions where possible! These can be reviewed at a new book in Alexander's room


- One new intimate scene for those with the optional patch.


- Four new achievements for those playing on Steam.


= Balance Changes

- Alexander
~ Changed the effect of the Prince's Regalia to be -20% MP cost rather than MP regen, as its effect was trivializing his MP management entirely, and the crown is quite good otherwise already.


- Sindarion full rework!
~ Poison damage buffed, and Wracking Poison desc expanded.
~ Most skills now have a stealth and non-stealth version that replace each other in the menu.
~ Stealth versions of most skills now ignore Cover and range reduction (note they still show as resist," but the damage is increased to offset).
~ Skill functions and damage allocations have changed.
~ Skill TP costs and TP regen changed up to create more of a rotational cycle.
~ Vanish now costs no TP, has High Priority, and grants 100% evasion vs most attacks on the round used. Also clarified that it removes fixates.
~ Stealth now increases attack by 20% and grants partial piercing damage.
~ Perfect Focus now has a 3-round cooldown and automatically activates if off CD when an attack would knock Sindarion out of stealth.
~ Ambush cooldown reduced.
~ Added a new set of skills, Dagger Rush/Deadly Rush.
~ Acidic Shiv is now under Alchemy and has an 8 round cooldown rather than one use per combat.
~ Sunthistle Tea is now Instant and has a two-round warmup.
Developer's note: Sindarion felt like he was badly underperforming, especially compared to Ligaea who shares a similar role of single-target physical attacker. More to the point, he was pretty boring. So, he's been completely reworked to be both more competitive, more engaging, and more unique. He now focuses on damage negation and the ability to hit enemies regardless of Cover or range while in Stealth.


- Buffs to Cynthia, including:
~ Farstrike damage increased.
~ Annihilate can no longer miss.
~ Clash now has slight priority.
~ Healing of Tranquil Fury increased.
~ Clash now pierces Cover effects.

- Buffs to Lorena, including:
~ Swift Strike restores an extra 10% MP.
~ Howling Slash restores an additional 20% MP and has a three-round cooldown (was four).
~ Shatter now restores 20% MP

- Adjustments to Somnus
~ Warding Thorns cost increased to 200 MP.
~ Siphon Aether cost reduced to 20 DP.
~ Shadow Lance now applies Touch of Night if the target is not already affected by Touch of Night.


- Some improvements to Sir Leonidas
~ Leonidas now uses unique gear when temporarily in the party.
~ Increased TGR, Hit, and Crit for Sir Leonidas slightly
~ Sir Leonidas now has passive effects when temporarily in the party (based off his effects as a support member).


= UI Improvements

• Increased the height of the game window by 64px. This is the max possible at present.
• Reduced the screen dimness caused by weather by 33%.

= Bugfixes

• Somnus's Enthrall will now be removed by damage at the appropriate rate.
• Calysia's Moonblades now generate Sacred Power as intended.
• Calysia's Purge Sorcery now cannot be evaded or reflected.
• Wildfire now properly deals 200% damage against a single enemy.
• Blazing Arrow now correctly consumes Ariadne's MP and may cause Burning.
• Various polishing changes throughout the game.

= Known Issues

• The proposal screen does not display Elite Units as a benefit. This will be addressed in a future version, as I ran out of time.
• The Quest Log quest descriptions may clip the border in some cases. This will be addressed in a future version, as I ran out of time.

 

[Lord Forte]

Noblesse Oblige: Legacy of the Sorcerer Kings v0.12 "The City of Merchants" is available to supporters on Patreon!

You can get it here with patreon access!

v0.12 will be releasing to the public in one month, on August 2nd!

v0.12 "The City of Merchants" Patch Notes (7-5-2024)​

- 80k words of text.

- Significant new section of the story.

- Over 30 new pieces of equipment!

- A new iteration of Castle Kharos!

- Two new areas in Castle Kharos (with the appropriate proposal investments)!

- Receive your first Custom Armor (with the appropriate proposal investment)!

- New loyalty skills/upgrades available (Cynthia, Lorena, Stelianos, Despoina, and Calyia [Alivaen path only, at present]).

- Six new achievements for those playing on Steam.

- Adjustments to Eris's backstory to address a logistical issue. The revised introduction scene can be viewed on version transition or from the Temporal Rift at the end of Chapter 11.

- Graphical improvements to Elysios City and Paraliapolis.

Screenshots​

 

[Lord Forte]

Noblesse Oblige: Legacy of the Sorcerer Kings v0.12.1.0 "The City of Merchants" is now available to the public! Get it on Patreon, on the game site, on Steam, or on Itch.io!

v0.12.1.0 "The City of Merchants" Patch Notes (8-2-2024)​

- 80k words of text.

- Significant new section of the story.

- Over 30 new pieces of equipment!

- A new iteration of Castle Kharos!

- Two new areas in Castle Kharos (with the appropriate proposal investments)!

- Receive your first Custom Armor (with the appropriate proposal investment)!

- New loyalty skills/upgrades available (Cynthia, Lorena, Stelianos, Despoina, and Calysia [Alivaen path only, at present]).

- Six new achievements for those playing on Steam.

- Adjustments to Eris's backstory to address a logistical issue. The revised introduction scene can be viewed on version transition or from the Temporal Rift at the end of Chapter 11.

- Graphical improvements to Elysios City and Paraliapolis.

= Balance Changes​

• Ariadne's Wildfire damage increased significantly, and damage multiplier against a single target increased to x2.5
• Burning no longer triggers against Instant skills.

- Reworked skills for Cynthia
~ Bloodfury and Tranquil Fury have been redesigned as Fury builders with new effects.
~ Damage of Blood Strike and Retaliate increased. Blood Strike now has a 2 round cooldown.
~ Farstrike is now usable in either oath and builds extra Fury if it hits an archer or sorcerer.
~ Clash now generates 2 Fury rather than 1.
~ New skill: Sweeping Strike, a Fury builder AoE.
~ New skill: Barbed Thrust, a Fury builder for Blood Oath that causes Bleeding.

• Cynthia's builder combos are now two-round combos with increased Fury generation but a cooldown.
• Annihilate damage is now 25% defense piercing,

• Somnus's Lucid Dream cost decreased to 20 DP. Cooldown changed to 3 rounds.
• Somnus's Nightfall cooldown removed.
• Somnus now generates an extra 5 DP per curse on the target, not counting Night's Touch.
• Dark Whisper now has a cooldown
• Sleep and Enthralled now cause Resilience.

• Lowered the rate of Chilled accumulation from melee attacks against Lorena to 35% (was 65%). Chilled rate remains 100% during Frozen Rampart.
• Frozen lasts 1 turn less against most bosses
• Frozen is now affected by (but does not cause) Resilience.
• Several Chapter 10 bosses are now correctly immune to Freeze.
• Fixed an issue where Lorena's physical attacks would break Frozen on the turn it was applied if they caused the Frozen effect.

• Added 1 point of Noble Support to the decision to deploy a large force to the Elysian Groves.
• Added 5 Lorena loyalty for those who chose to face Somnus in Hypernia.
• Changed 1 point of Popular Support to 5 points of Alcinian Support in the Alcina's Faithful proposal. This change will be automatically applied on the version transition from the Temporal Rift.
• Added a new "Elite Overwhelming" effect that is effective against tanks in plate armor (but ineffective against Alexander). This has been retroactively added to Royal Knights in Chapter 10.

= Features​

• The Autosave slot can now be reached quickly by pressing Shift in the save menu. This is indicated in the header.
• F7 now saves a screenshot to a "Screenshots" folder in the game directory.
• The Proposal menu now shows Elite Units as a benefit and has a new category for "Other" benefits such as new castle areas.
• Factor effects for decisions now show the current value in parenthesis.
• Added "Unique" items. These items are designated by a "(Unique)" tag at shops, and can only be purchased once.
• Character nametags during dialog are now available as an option in the System menu. Note: this option is experimental, please report any bugs encountered.
• All Prince's Command effects through 100 Loyalty are now implemented.

= UI Improvements​

• Fixed clipping in the quest log description box.
• Fixed weird extra linebreaks in quest log objectives.
• Re-added luck stat when checking stat change effects of items.
• Rewrote the code for the item comparison on the right-hand menu in shops; comparisons are now done by total stat value change (with 50 HP/MP = 1 point of other stats).

= Bugfixes​

• Fixed the incorrect Army Size bonus for Siege Weaponry (now gives +1 Army Size as intended; was incorrectly +3). This will be automatically corrected on the version transition from the Temporal Rift for those who invested.
• Fixed the benefits for proposals added in Chapter 10 being double counted. This will be automatically corrected on the version transition from the Temporal Rift.
• Attackers now correctly take damage from Lorena's Glaciate if triggered by a freeze-immune enemy attacking.

 

[Lord Forte]

Noblesse Oblige: Legacy of the Sorcerer Kings v0.13.1.1 "Meetings and Partings" is now available to the public! Get it on Patreon, on the game site, on Steam, or on Itch.io!

v0.13.1.1 "Meetings and Partings" Patch Notes (10-18-2024)​

54k words of text.

- Significant new section of the story.

- New combat sections.

- One new intimate scene for those with the optional patch.

- Four new achievements for those playing on Steam.

- New level up skills available for several party members!

- New art for Ligaea! You will have the option to swap to this art when continuing from the Temporal Rift, or can change it at any time from the System menu. The patch for the original art can still be used. New art by Mimo.




= Balance Changes

- Increased the cost of Grace of Air to 200 MP

- Strategos Theseus the Hammer and Sir Zenon the Breaker are now immune to Freeze effects.


= Other Changes

- Ligaea's Rapid Fire renamed to Rapid Volley (in the interests of removing period-incorrect uses of "fire")

- Adjusted the walls and floor in Ariadne's private room

- Improved floor and walls on the airship home from Avalonia, plus a little adjustment to the mapping

- Added silver spears to all Calistrian-style statues of Alivae to match the flavor text


= UI Improvements

- Added a partial settings menu to the title screen, mainly to set volume, though instant messages and animations can also be set here.

- Improved the game's ability to detect volume changes when moving to a new version (thanks to a script by Maltava

- Alexander's expression now changes in combat when using Galeforce

- Loading an autosave then saving the game will now default to saving in the most recent save slot rather than the autosave slot.

- Updated the relationships status page. Let me know if any changes you'd expect are not reflected here.


= Bugfixes

- Various typo reports and fixes to old content (thanks in particular to Joker/Amaror for many comprehensive reports!)-

- New pathing logic for the patrols at Castle Salericos. They should no longer literally get stuck in the weeds. XD

- Many, many typo fixes thanks to Lamsey and Joker/Amaror

- Fixed a few minor castle customization details (new doors customization has been put off until a future update, but will be coming)Fixed two spots in Chapter 4 where the game could become stuck if text was advanced too quickly

- Changed all in-game music tracks in .mp3 format to .ogg format, which should prevent audio distortions from occurring on some systems.


= Screenshots

 

[HeroicSpirit]

How would this world handle potions or pills that allow someone to alter their body over time (be that over several days or over several months) to that of another gender, either feminizing it or masculinizing it?

 

[Lord Forte]

How would this world handle potions or pills that allow someone to alter their body over time (be that over several days or over several months) to that of another gender, either feminizing it or masculinizing it?

I don't really think such things are within the nature of the world of Noblesse. You might be able to use sorcery to do something akin to hormone therapy, but I'm not sure the knowledge exists to target that properly. Overall, excluding beings of aether such as demons whose bodies are already malleable, I don't really think the sorcery available would be suited to that. Mainly, most sorcery isn't... conceptually aware, in a way? I've noted that enchanted quills can transcribe text but not translate text, because the spell has no concept of the meaning of the words. So, if sorcery doesn't really understand the concept of "gender," you can't just cast a spell to change gender. You'd have to make every change manually. A very skilled sorcerer with the right affinity could probably do such a thing. but it would be a very intensive and manual process.

 

[Lord Forte]

Noblesse Oblige: Legacy of the Sorcerer Kings v0.14 "The Shadows Within" is available to supporters on Patreon!

You can get it here with patreon access!

v0.14 will be releasing to the public in one month, on January 31st!

v0.14 "The Shadows Within Patch Notes (1-3-2025)​

- 104k(!) words of content.

- Significant new section of the story.

- New partial Castle Kharos iteration.

- New combat sections.

- Major optional side section for some routes (those with Somnus who kept Tychus for interrogation).

- Five new achievements for those playing on Steam.

- New level up skills available for several party members!

- Three new loyalty skills (Ariadne 75, Ligaea 75, Somnus 50).

- One new throne room scene (Cynthia).

- New Ariadne art! Ariadne's outfit has been redone by Mimo! I'm very happy with the results of this. A patch to use the old outfit may be added in the menu at a later time.

- New bust art cut-ins for "ultimate" skills such as Wildfire and Power Shot!



- Door customization for the doors in the throne room at Castle Kharos have been added!

Screenshots​

​