Hi all, first of all I wanted to say it's amazing this site is still up as 13 years, I remember visiting it as a teen when Rise of Legends first came out. Around a year ago, I dug out my old copy of RoL and started seeing how moddable it was, and after far too many hours, working of the precedent set by motter and alincarpetman, I believe I have made a few breakthroughs. First of all, let's start with Kahan, the cut Steppe-themed nomads with cities on the backs of monsters. Through a lot of datamining and some inutuition based on a faction in another RTS I helped with, which bore many similarities to what little we know about the planned mechanics for Kahan (Mobile structures, with territory created by totemlike structures), I think I have managed to reconstruct their roster to a degree.
Kahan was the fourth faction planned for Rise of Legends, intended to occupy the large Steppe area north of the Alin Desert and Coatl jungles, which can be seen on the campaign map but is never visited. promotional material, including the map of Aio, shows that this area is called the Beastlands. The unique gimmick of Kahan was supposed to be mobile cities on the backs of giant animals, with a strong Asian steppe nomad aesthetic. From other elements in the files and concept art, they also were planned to have a strong spiritual theme as opposed to the magical Alin, technological Vinci, and magitek Coatl. They possessed a number of "undead" or spirit units, with Cairns and standing stones, and Yontash, in the retail game, retains abilities associated with stealing souls and the Void. Additionally, an unused unit flag for "undead" units exists in the files.
Kahan seems to have been cut quite early, with many of its assets still using Rise of Nations sprites, or still using Vinci assets. No structure for their mobile city concept exists, and all their surviving structures are static. However, some traces for the mobile building gimmick remain, such as border totems that would generate territory, and mobile resource dropoffs for miners, called Nomad Wagons.
Units
Miner - Nomad, worked in conjunction with Nomad Wagon. These guys are restorable.
-Nomad Wagon - Seemingly a mobile drop point, as opposed to a static mine, working in conjunction with Nomads. Could be upgraded to fire arrows at enemies, like the Dutch Merchant wagons in Rise of Nations Thrones and Patriots. Like other Kahan assets, seems to have been cut early on, as it uses RoN merchant wagon assets.
-Barbarian - Recycled into the neutral unit. Had an ability called Sweeping Charge.
-Berserker - Recycled into the neutral unit.
-Ogre - Actually more of a cyclops, was going to have a mix of weapons, including clubs, swords, and axes. Trained at the Ogre Fort, which was recycled into the neutral building, the Cave. Fully restorable, including animations, but weapons are not recoverable. Not known if these guys were a multi soldier or single soldier unit.
-Stone Ogre - Ranged ogre variant which threw rocks. Covered in handprint bodypaint, and has a large wooden sling full of rocks on its back, as well as a shovel. Trained at the Ogre Fort, which was recycled into the neutral building, the Cave. Model and animations are restorable by deleting all bxml files and reconstructing their material, skeleton, and unit graphics entries. I just managed to restore them today, so they need further tests to see if animations actually work ect.
-Ettin - Two headed variant of Ogre. Going by the missing projectile called Ettin Arrow, it was likely armed with a crossbow. Trained at the Ogre Fort, which was recycled into the neutral building, the Cave. Not known if these guys were a multi soldier or single soldier unit.
-Cave Bat - Recycled into the neutral unit, Cave Drake.
-Shaman - Almost nothing survives.
-Huntmaster - Presumably ranged unit, uses the Ancient Age archer sprite from Rise of Nation. Nothing else survives.
-Mammoth Chariot - Exactly as it says on the tin, a chariot pulled by a woolly mammoth. Not recoverable.
-Kragar Beast - seemingly a siege unit with a boulder firing catapult mounted on its back. Only some concept art and its projectile survive. Not recoverable.
-Banshee - Undead unit, with a unique sprite of a corpse-like woman with flowing red hair. May have had Mesmerize and or Slow as abilities. No other trace survives.
-Will o Wisp - Undead unit, with a unique sprite of a blue orb with a skeletal jaw inside. May have had Mesmerize and or Slow as abilities. No other trace survives.
-Spectral Hunter - Almost nothing survives.
-Ghost Scout - Almost nothing survives.
Buildings
-War Camp - Interesting mix of a barracks and fort, with patrolling Nomads on the battlements, which indicates it also had a defensive role. Fully restorable.
-Cairn - Stone Cairn with a creepy unnatural glow, likely used to train undead units. Fully restorable.
-Camp - Yurtlike building with a unique corral with two low poly animated dogs outside. Fully restorable.
-Ogre Fort - Recycled into the neutral Cave building.
-Border Totem - A woolly mammoth skill mounted on a post. Due to working on an RTS mod with a faction that coincidentally has an almost identical intended function, I am fairly sure these would place territory on the map, where Kahan could build its static structures and deploy its mobile ones. Restorable, but model and textures are corrupted.
-Spirit Totem - Larger totem shaped like an arrangement of screaming skulls, going by its sprite. Not restorable.
Heroes
-Yontash - Yontash was originally intended to be a Kahan hero, eventually recycled into the Coatl campaign. Remnants of this can be seen in the campaign, as he still uses Barbarian and Berserker units, and has magical or spiritual abilities with little in common with the Coatl. Additionally, the totems and flags used in early Coatl campaign maps are in fact Kahan Steppe assets. Yontash had two abilities that did not make it into his final incarnation, Feast of Souls, and Void.
-Belg, the Ogre King - pretty self explanatory. Big Ogre King dude, has three abilities, Stun, Stone Wall, and Ogre Rage. He is linked to a unit or hero called Gurr, who might have been a unique mini hero that served as his bodyguard, armed with an axe. Alternatively, Gurr might be an early name for Belg. Restorable.
-Kaihgra, the Snow Witch - Beyond Yontash, Kaihgra was evidently going to be an elemental being similar to the Alin Genies, and a fairly prominent being in RoL overall. The multiplayer map, Kagra's lungs, likely references it. Some concept art of Kaihgra exists in the RoL art dump, and its abilities helpfully have descriptions. Kaihgra seems to have been a shapeshifting snow entity. Its abilities were all snow based, including Arctic Wind, which shared units in its radius, Illusion, which created duplicates of friendly units in the radius (similar to the RoN general ability), and three that have no descriptions, Blizzard, Ice Wurm, and Freeze.
Ice Wurm was seemingly a snow dragon form of Kaihgra. Neither form of Kaihgra is restorable.
A few other Kahan traces exist, including small Yurts, which are restorable, as well as the cut variant of neutral village, which was going to be used on Steppe Maps and strongly resembles the concept art of a Kahan city. These settlements are restorable with some file trickery. A number of Kahan themed assets for that terrain type can still be seen in scenario editor, such as the totems or fetishes used on some Coutl maps, as well as standing stones and a massive stone bridge that might be associated with the Ogres.
The Steppe Map terrain was strongly associated with Kahan as their "home" terrain, eventually be recycled for Vinci maps. Additionally, the Arctic maps and their unique eastern style ruins may have been associated with Kahan, given the ice and undead-themed units and Ogres. A cut map, known as Ogre Ruins, has a surviving image, showing an arctic landscape with a strange hollowed out crag structure in the center.
Interestingly, I found an archived post here on Heavengames (http://rol.heavengames.com/cgi-bin/forums/display.cgi?action=ct&f=8,278,,10) from shortly after the release of RoL, that was quite similar of what I found through file editing. It was dismissed as a fanon faction in the thread, but I am inclined to think it may have been a dev from BHG dumping some info on the down-low. While much of the info appears erroneous, the overall depiction of the faction does seem pretty close.
Kahan was the fourth faction planned for Rise of Legends, intended to occupy the large Steppe area north of the Alin Desert and Coatl jungles, which can be seen on the campaign map but is never visited. promotional material, including the map of Aio, shows that this area is called the Beastlands. The unique gimmick of Kahan was supposed to be mobile cities on the backs of giant animals, with a strong Asian steppe nomad aesthetic. From other elements in the files and concept art, they also were planned to have a strong spiritual theme as opposed to the magical Alin, technological Vinci, and magitek Coatl. They possessed a number of "undead" or spirit units, with Cairns and standing stones, and Yontash, in the retail game, retains abilities associated with stealing souls and the Void. Additionally, an unused unit flag for "undead" units exists in the files.
Kahan seems to have been cut quite early, with many of its assets still using Rise of Nations sprites, or still using Vinci assets. No structure for their mobile city concept exists, and all their surviving structures are static. However, some traces for the mobile building gimmick remain, such as border totems that would generate territory, and mobile resource dropoffs for miners, called Nomad Wagons.
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Ice Wurm was seemingly a snow dragon form of Kaihgra. Neither form of Kaihgra is restorable.
A few other Kahan traces exist, including small Yurts, which are restorable, as well as the cut variant of neutral village, which was going to be used on Steppe Maps and strongly resembles the concept art of a Kahan city. These settlements are restorable with some file trickery. A number of Kahan themed assets for that terrain type can still be seen in scenario editor, such as the totems or fetishes used on some Coutl maps, as well as standing stones and a massive stone bridge that might be associated with the Ogres.
The Steppe Map terrain was strongly associated with Kahan as their "home" terrain, eventually be recycled for Vinci maps. Additionally, the Arctic maps and their unique eastern style ruins may have been associated with Kahan, given the ice and undead-themed units and Ogres. A cut map, known as Ogre Ruins, has a surviving image, showing an arctic landscape with a strange hollowed out crag structure in the center.
Interestingly, I found an archived post here on Heavengames (
[This message has been edited by darkinterloper (edited 05-09-2020 @ 06:37 PM).]