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0 A.D. Development Report #15 Wildfire Games, the international group of volunteers developing 0 A.D., is happy to present this week's 0 A.D. development report. If you want to find out more about the development of this open-source, cross-platform real-time strategy game or if you are interested in game development in general, it might provide an interesting read. If you want to be part of this project, we urge you to post your application in our forums or just grab a task from our list of open tickets and get right to it. We are currently looking for Gameplay, AI, Sound and Graphics Programmers along with Animators and 3D & texture artists. You prefer to do something else than programming or drawing? Luckily for your portfolio we are also looking for Video Editors, a Documentation Manager and Scenario Designers. Still no luck? Head to our forums and join our active community! !!! We are in need of (skilled) programmers. If you are one, redirect yourself to this thread. Your contributions are crucial !!! Team News Our 'family' keeps expanding! A warm welcome to Scythetwirler, who has been working on our multiplayer lobby among other things. Translations Work has begun on translating 0 A.D. into many, many languages. Using the Transifex translating system, everyone can help! Check out this link. Screenshot of the Month Enrique's new horses (WIP). Animated transparent manes and moving armor are also in the pipeline (thanks to Wraitii). Programming & Art Mythos_Ruler added a new map (Savanna River), rebalanced many units/technologies/... and laid the groundwork for our next civilization: the Seleucid Empire. Yves has been hard at work upgrading Spidermonkey from 1.8.5 (which is old and unsupported) to a more recent version (v24 or later). He committed one patch that solves the massive performance problems we got with the new SpiderMonkey versions in lategame by changing the way different AI players are separated from each other. The second big patch adapted our code with the old SpiderMonkey version to match the most important constraints required by newer versions without updating yet. The third patch removed the JS Debugger temporarily because it will require a partial rewrite but doesn't have priority for the update. After these changes the WIP patch for the new SpiderMonkey is now much smaller and easier to handle (test, update and review). Wraitii added a fishing boat for our latest civilization: the Ptolomaic Egyptians. He also implemented some new animals done by Micket: crocodiles, sharks and hawks. He optimized the water code making it faster (speed-up of foam generation code, ...) and more modern. Last but not least, he is overhauling the Aegis bot (AI), squashing AI bugs and improving their capabilities. Sanderd17 implemented countless functionality fixes; his energy/time went primarily to reworking formations and chasing (i.e. attacking fleeing units, animals). Enrique has been reworking our horses, as they were getting a bit outdated. Your cavalry charges will be even more heroic! Leper & Historic_Bruno fixed a number of crashes and other bugs. A full list of changes is available in the SVN log (any similarity with 99,9 % of all Google Chrome change logs is pure coincidence...) Bajter and Kabzerek are working on the summary screen. Their changes should provide more information to the player (after-battle statistics...). AnnieQ has been working on new unit cards for the Celtic factions. BoeseRaupe has been working on the hero icon and a way to delete a units group with a right mouse click. Lordgood: Artiste extraordinaire and My Little Pony-afficionado, has created a new Roman tower and a new wonder & homestead for the Carthaginians. Our "Brony" (Brother + Pony) also started working on the building set for the Seleucids. Dumbo has been working on improving unit behavior when choosing opponents. Itms added a town bell function. Enemy raid incoming? With one mouse-click your female citizens rush to the nearest building to find shelter. Scythetwirler & Josh have implemented various multiplayer lobby fixes to the alpha 15/16 server and alpha 16 client. They are hard at work fixing the post-game lobby disconnects and the problems with hosting to improve your multiplayer experience in alpha 16. Apart from the lobby, Josh has also been working towards a more intuitive lobby login UI in the new "modern" style (WIP by Pureon), has done various UI engine cleanup, and re-worked the selection back-end to yield ~2% overall performance increase. Mimo improved the way trade works. Now the trade management is centralised so there's no need to click every trader. Stanislas69 has been reworking the Iberian barracks and corral, and the Gallic mill and farmstead. Music & Sound Omri_Lahav has been working on new peace tracks for the different civilizations and freshening up the score. A professional tin whistle player will redo the Celts / Gauls, a trombone player will record the low brassy parts on Honor Bound / Elysian Fields, and the Qanun player will be brought in to add another unique color to the Ptolemaic Egyptians. I think it is fair to say Omri is setting new standards for music in freeware software. LAVS has been working on battle sounds that will make every melee more compelling.

Okay I will do some sketches for this, to practise drawing.

Have you tried importing them into 0ad? I don't know how you will have to position the model before exporting so that it can be placed against mountains easily. Perfect would be that it could clip to the mountain like the docks clip to the water, but that would require coding...

It would probably be a good idea to mention at this point that Apple doesn't allow scripting engines into IOS apps and 0AD requires a javascript engine. EDIT: See next post

Hello everybody, Yesterday i looked on IndieDB for a cool game to be playing and I came aross 0 A.D. First of all I want to thank all volunteers at Wildfire Games for making such a great game, with only donations! When I first played this game I was amazed by the graphics and how stable this game is for an Alpha build. I also got some nostalgic feelings from AoE 2 when I played this game. Probably because this was first a mod for that game. I made a video showcasing this awesome game, full of nostalgic feelings from AoE 2. Perhaps my channel isnt that big, but I hope that its fun Sorry if the sounds are to loud at some points. This is the first time I have to change settings in the game folder itself Back to playing this game, now JMLigthart PS: Keep up the great development of this game.

I used this images as a reference: Maybe a third step would be nice, anyway Good Work

I just found that very interesting for navy concept : http://lakodaemon.co.uk/ships-sea-peoples/

Maybe you could make an other type of obstruction. One that prevents user from building but not units from walking. This way you would also get a starting point for units on walls.

A simple fix would be to increase their "footprint" to their actual model size so they can't overlap each other for almost half of their size.

why not make a guide on http://strategywiki.org/wiki

I can confirm that the SVN version appears to be broken currently. That's always the risk of using the dev version.

Units 1.Infantry Payg (Infantry) Daylami Warrior (Arteshtar-i Daylamig) Dismounted Cavalry (Arteshtar-iPayahdag) Kurdish Tribesmen Archer (Kamandar-e Eransahr) Omani Marine (Laskar-e Mazun) 2. Cavalry Aswaran-e Dihqanan (Dihqan cavalry) Aswaran-e Azadan (Azadan cavalry) PS: become Grivpanvar (Clibanarii) when promoted. Lakhmid cavalry 3. Champion unit Aswaran-e Zhayedan (Sassanid Household Cavalry) Pushtighbane Daylamig (Daylami Guards) Zarrin Nizagan (Golden Spearman) Kamandar-e Zhayedan (Sassanid Household Archers) War Elephant or Indian Corps 4. Siege Onager (Falakan-e Majaniq) Scorpion Battering Ram Siege Tower Ballista 5. Navy Omani Dhow Roman/Byzantine Dromon 6. Heroes Kawad I Kosrow I Bahrām VI Čōbīn Kosrow II Šahrwarāz Yazdgird III

I have always believed that the Roman church was just a continuation of the Imperial bureaucracy all the clerks became clerics Enjoy the Choice

looks good on first sight.

The animations should start from the default stand pose, and end with it. But apart from that, it may be quite simple. How long it should be, depends on your feeling. We can easily stretch or shorten an animation (though that also stretches and shortens the first part of the animation). For how animations work: animals (and other units) have different states (roam, feed/idle, attack, flee, ...) for each state, we can define a different set of animations, and play a sound (currently a single sound, but looping sounds should also be possible in the future. So we can play a sound when we switch to attack mode, but we can's play a sound when we switch between two idle variations f.e. As not all idle animations are expected to have the same sound (you can't play the howling sound when the wolf is sleeping), we can't play any sounds. All the other animations will work. They're all states. The attack animation are a bit more difficult, as the engine expects that the attack happens while standing still. So the animation needs to return to its original position. You can take a look at the tiger animation thread, I believe the wolf animation could be a bit the same (if the wolf has the same bones, you don't even need to make an animation for it, the animation can be reused).

Hmmm, we can add sounds to a type of animation (like adding a sound to the attack animation), but we can't add sounds to a variation of the type (like one of the idle animations), that could cause a problem for the howling. It's still nice to get it in though, but it probably won't be very nice in game. Also, I'd like some very still idle animations (like something sleeping). Predators are normally very still (except when they're hunting), and too many repeated animations make it look silly. But those are mainly game-concerns. I really love the animations you made.

I'd wish to complement Wraitii's, Isdh's and Don's suggestions above. I understand that 0 A.D. is a RTS between AoE and SC. Given the well known premises of the genre, it doesn't pretend to simulate a whole civilization rise from Stone Age to Iron age, nor a tactical mission that takes a mere few hours or weeks to complete. Its scope is in the between. Alright there are technologies to buy, but it's the premise of the genre, as I said. Also, most of the ideas below don't add much "hated" micro-management, because many could be automated and even "invisible" to the player. And I don't mix micro-management (micro-action) for game-awareness (or meta-play?). So, Trees shouldn't regenerate. Not enough time in one game time-frame. Note that Spellforce, a kind of RTS had Elves grow trees to harvest wood and provide cover, but you could say that magic was used.As I suggested elsewhere, you could also quickly destroy trees (for a zero or small income) with citizen soldiers or even mercenaries/champions, to deny the enemy player from using it in the future and force him to buy wood in the market. I called it "scorched land" or "spoiled land" strategy, that was actual warfare.Berry bushes and fruit trees should regenerate. I wouldn't call taking care of that an superfluous micro-management, only a realistic implementation that would grant diversity to the food system. The rest is only a matter of game balance. Lower initial stock and constant slow regenerating rate (one unit at a time)? Periodic blooming (original stock appearing in a few seconds) simulating a harvesting time every several minutes? Needed technology (arboriculture) to simulate the evolution from the early neolithic gatherers?A counter-measure could be the destroying of such bushes/trees. While not productive (when food supply is null), those plants could be harvested to make wood, like normal trees. A security system would prevent the workers AI to harvest them while not micro-managed and ordered to. A second order could even be needed when the worker is on the spot, and the order would be forgotten when the current bush/tree is cut down and harvested.It would be possible to deprive the enemy player from a near future berry harvesting, and to harvest wood without a market when the last normal tree was chopped down and you still need a last batch of wood (what a desperate situation!). It would free space to build as currently.Mines shouldn't regenerate, but maybe, technology could emulate new veins finding or better mining techniques. This would partly refill the mine(s). You could imagine a "once for all" technology buy, or a "building-bound" upgrade buy (like in American Conquest), or both (the technology unlocking the individual upgrades). You could have such refilling technology periodically available (with cool-down) or only used once (or more if historical staggered technologies). Basically, technology and upgrades would cost much wood and some metal, food and time (virtual workers upgrading the mine).You could condition such civ. special like the Laurion Silver (Athenians) to the possession of at least one functional ore mine when the "technology" is bought (or a political decision is voted). Also, the mine object could stay even when depleted, just to add diversity to the landscape. It would be impassable terrain but you could build over it (deleting it).Why not, you could also have a very slow regenerating rate that would be enough for one worker (in upgraded rich mines) in the end game, abit in the same way depleted mines in American Conquest would still provide a small income. Even if good players wouldn't care this micromanagement, it would add some life in the towns...Why not, mines, even non depleted ones, could be permanently razed to deny the enemy player its income, or to build an important building when you lack space. Only workers units (citizen) (and siege units?) could hack it and that would take a lots of time, more than destroying a building anyways (you wouldn't destroy the mine buildings only, you would sap, fill, flood all the galleries (even if some could be open-sky).Corralled animals, while costing food (maybe only diminishing the food amount they provide on slaughter?) or land, should have an advantage over hunting. Granted current living horses decrease current cost of cavalry (or does the total number of corralled horses permanently decrease that cost?), and corralled animals are "stored" food resource you denied the enemy player from using it, you can capture and use at will (as in AoM). Should it have some effects, corralled animal could be used to lower the vegetable/meat ratio when hunting has depleted the area.Both corralled horses and sheep could have a chance to reproduce in the game time-frame. (elephants too?). This is obviously the historical reason why neolithic populations did corral animals.Corralled animals could grow larger/healthier and provide more food than hunting (like in AoM if I recall). This contradicts with the former proposal of a food upkeep but it could be seen as one of protein resources, should it be of value, again.Corralled animals or more precisely corral buildings with animal inside, would produce automatically a small food income (animal proteins as far as the ratio is concerned), simulating dairy products and young cattle meat (with no micro-management). This income could be a fix growing rate (the more animals captured, the larger the rate) or a slowly decreasing rate, regenerated each time a new animal is corralled.Fish: I like the non-linear regeneration, but over-fishing should be a danger. Maybe there is a way to add some diversity here too (granted, fishing is already a particular food resource management per self):Micro-managing could be mandatory, even with a non linear regeneration rate: after some time of over-fishing in a depleted spot (slowly regenerating, then), the spot could suddenly and permanently disappear.This kind of resources could eventually but still seldom appear during a game at random position but usually far from the lands (the coastal areas being first exploited). This could be a boon for a lucky player, and add some (welcomed?) randomness in well known maps.Should the food income from fish diminish the longer the fishing boat has to sail to the port, or do we consider salt as a well known and used food preservative (used on board)? Maybe a technology could (partly) alleviate the preservation problem?Farm fields, as it was said, should be larger proportionally to the other buildings and no overlapping with each other. Also, the number of workers should be limited (to be honest, I don't know whether it is already the case).Maybe a technology could allow to add one or more workers per field.I liked it very much the way time would be spent to "build" a field and wait for the first harvest (as in American Conquest).Most importantly, I'd like to see seasonal harvest, or simply field depletion and regeneration if you prefer, as in American Conquest. I don't see it as an unwanted micro-management, but as a core strategy for some civs. If you consider a game time-frame may exceed one year, then you need workers in the fields until harvest is completed. That's not the case in AoE, and even if AoE is the main source of inspiration for 0 A.D., that don't prevent from making the system better (as in more interesting or subtle). If you don't care about planned harvesting, then go for mercenaries and champions (who live out of the pile of food and the market). That would even make a real difference between them and elite citizen (I play with Alpha 13). Also when you destroy an enemy field, it may be only a minor drawback for a rich opponent, whereas it should cost a year of production in real life. The mere fighting in/on a field should damage it a little (think about those cavalry depredation during the spring and early summer).

If you want comments by other players, an animated image is better. To get it in game, you need to give the .blend file.

.blend is great! Great work by the way! It's amazing! Don't get me wrong, but I just think the attack could be more aggressive. To me it seems to be a little bit too harmless. edit: Oh my god! I love those idle animations, especially the second one! You are one amazing rigger/animator! Do you work in the gaming industry? edit2: Oh my god! I just love them! I love the running! I love each one of them!

Nice! For great justice I edited your post and show the image without opening the link.

One more Idle animation to go. Texture flickering in some animations is due to the fact that the mesh is not converted into triangles yet. Animations speed can be modified on the actor .xml to fit our needs.