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  1. Hello there, long time following, first time posting. I’d like to start of by thanking everybody involved in the development of this marvelous game, for doing such an amazing job. The game has been an absolute a joy to play, is loads of fun, and is a more than worthy successor to AOE. In fact I’d go so far as to say it’s way better, and has great potential for becoming even better. Secondly, I’d like to apologize for what might be a rather lengthy post, full of stuff you’ve probably read a million times before, so please bear with me. The reason I might repeat some stuff already brought up in various other topics and discussions, is simply to give some more weight to certain already existing ideas. Also, I’m not a coder or programmer, and could never do what you guys have pulled off. I’ve been playing this game for many years now (almost exclusively single player) and have seen it transform from the buggy, earlier alpha’s when building walls was still a mere fantasy, to the beautiful gem it is today. And I know many years before I even heard of this game, many people were dedicated, and have worked tirelessly to bringing this dream alive. Again, I applaud you all! I just wanted to leave my impressions, ideas and suggestions about this game, as a first time poster. I understand that many things in this game are the way they are for a reason, and I might not always know this reason, so please forgive my noobishness. I do not wish to step on any ones toes, so feel free to disregard any point I raise. I understand they might not all be realistic or feasible, neither do I expect any of them to be implemented. Just my personal thoughts and ideas. So, here I go: 1) AI : I love the AI, for mainly 1 reason. It poses a genuine challenge, which always keeps things interesting. Having said that, I know it’s still a work in progress, and has many glitches. I feel that the AI needs certain basic protocols, that seem logical for a human, which are overlooked. For example, when the AI attacks (early in the game) with a large force, but gets defeated, it will quickly send another, usually inferior force as a second wave, and so on. I think the AI should always hold off an attack, until it’s numbers are stronger than the previous failed attack. This would help with the perception that the AI is just overly aggressive without any reason or logic. Also, it tends to keep attacking the same positions over and over again, which makes placing fortifications a no-brainer. If it gets defeated at the same location for more than 3 times, it should really automatically start thinking about attacking form another (less fortified) angle. I would also love to see it build new “towns” in conquered territories, so it isn’t so vulnerable when attacked at it’s “capital”, as well as build walls to protect its “investments”. It would be really nice to see the AI build a planned and highly concentrated, walled area. Also, gatherers in general, whether AI, or your own, should never forage in enemy territory, unless explicitly ordered to do so. Neither should troops belonging to the AI nor yourself, decide (on their own accord) to attack enemy units when those enemy units are in their own territory, by default. I hate those accidental skirmishes that end up being Armageddon type battles for survival. 2) Scale: I love everything on a large scale, as I am sure many of you do to. I regularly play with a population of over 2000 in late game (although lag becomes unbearable at that point), and I am genuinely impressed with the ability of the game to handle so many units. But as technology evolves, processors become more powerful, bugs are fixed and the mechanics of the game are streamlined, I would love to see even more, even grander things. Bigger, more realistic maps, able to support populations of thousands on either side, with ease… No fixed population caps anymore. I know… I’m a dreamer… 3) Citizen soldiers : I know it’s a controversial subject, so I’m sorry to bring it up. I believe, as many others that this original feature is actually historically inaccurate, and compromises the potential for amazing gameplay. Having a larger civilian population from which you recruit military units would be much more realistic, and interesting. You can retain the citizen soldiers, but they should never exceed the “civilian population” (which includes slaves and serfs), which have historically always been (significantly) larger in every civilization featured in 0AD. 4) Economy & Population: I believe economy is the least developed aspect of the game, and I feel that it could be made a lot more immersive, and realistic, without necessarily becoming needlessly complicated. Try to think of an arcade version of the old classics like Pharaoh, or Ceasar, The Settlers III & IV, but also more contemporary games like banished or the Anno series. 0AD fundamentally differs form these games in that it is a base-builder, and not a city builder. But I think it can be a lot more than “just” a base builder. Perhaps a town builder. Imagine reserving micromanagement of units specifically for military units. Instead of micro managing hundreds of individual, static units, imagine managing a working population, automatically going about their assigned jobs, governed by an AI. Workplaces that need laborers, markets that need produce to sell, raw materials that need to be transported to the “industries” that need them. A population that needs “services”, like taverns and pubs, cultural venues like theatres, temples and shrines to different gods, courthouses etc... A population that naturally expands through immigration and new births (as long as new, or upgraded housing is provided). How about a coin based system, in which wood, food, metal and stone are only some of the many goods produced, and required for building, upgrading and recruiting. Things like leather, linen, wool, milk, coal, clay (for making bricks and pottery), fabrics, jewelry, a variety of agricultural products, fish, tools etc… And all these goods would have a coin value. I also think having fixed, non-depletable resource points would be an extremely interesting thing from a strategic point of view. It would give you, the player, and the AI a really good reason to fight. Resources such as metal (which I’d rather see split in gold and Iron ore), should be mined from set locations, in some rocky hills, or alluvial mine fields. Farming should only be done on fertile lands (as opposed to the middle of the desert (which is possible now). Hunting on hunting grounds, where game automatically replenishes (through new births). Stone from a stone quarry. Logs from forests that slowly grow back over time, fish from anywhere in the ocean. All these things don’t just deplete in real life, so why should they in the game? Rather than managing finite resources, you should manage the constant supply and demand of resources and goods. Why not introduce fixed trade routes, not unlike AOEIII, where foreign traders are spawned at the edge of the map, and travel to the other edge trading at available trading posts as they go. And all this economic activity should bring in direct revenue, (e.g. goldmine or export of specialized goods), or indirect revenue in the form of taxes (coin), which would in turn be used to maintain services, building projects, research and your military. 5) Maps : I love many of the maps in the game, and many have clearly been made with a lot of care and attention to detail. All I can say is that I prefer the most realistic looking maps, with real topographical features and diverse biotopes. Also, the bigger the better. I feel that on larger maps, attacking your enemies feels like a real campaign. Small maps feel unbearably unrealistic to me. Who builds their town right next to their enemies’ town?? Anyway, realism, naturalism and size are definitely the way to go for 0AD’s maps. 6) Buildings : I love diversity in a game, and I think 0AD could use (even) more diversity in building types and variations. With a more expanded and advanced economy come many new specialized buildings from which new technologies can be researched. Also more eye-candy, such as decorations, statues, parks and plazas are always welcome to jazz up your town. The ultimate goal should be to create a beautiful and realistic looking, functional town, bustling with life, on one hand, and conquering your enemies town(s) on the other hand. Adding animations to any building that has employees or is garrisoned, together with the hustle and bustle of raw materials and finished goods being whisked back and forth from storage yards to workplaces, would really bring the town alive. I think houses should be able to upgrade (just 3 levels in total) based on the services you’ve provided in your city. Higher level houses can then accommodate a higher population. Also, I think the building “barracks” should be split in to 3 distinct buildings: “Melee Infantry barracks”, “Ranged infantry barracks” and “Stables”. I think that would make more sense. Stables should always be necessary before recruiting cavalry. Some more buildings for variety and economic realism could include a siege workshop, Iron smelter, weapon smith, tool smith, leatherworks, weavers, storage yard, granary, slaughterhouse, herbalist, huntinglodge, fresh-water well, a variety of differentiated farms, claypit, brickmaker, potter, jeweler, work-camp, logging-camp, sawmill, charcoal maker, and of course, every city/town needs a proper palace, as well as a central (ceremonial) square. But mainly a palace… 7) Military : I won’t say much about this subject, because I know it is still a work in progress. All that I will say is that the Total War series, by far, have some of the most realistic battle mechanics of any game. It would be really awesome to see a simplified (arcade) version of those mechanics implemented in this game. 8) Random stuff : Why is the wonder for the Celts Stonehenge? Don’t get me wrong, I think it is one of the prettiest wonders in the game, but lacks historical accuracy. Stonehenge was originally erected more than 2 millennia prior to the arrival of Celtic culture in Great Britain. I know that no more civilizations will be added to the current game, but I’d still like to argue for the official inclusion of the Chinese, as well as the kingdom of Kush, whose capital was ancient Meroe (the Nubians). The Chinese traded extensively (though indirectly) with the Mediterranean world, as well as with Mauryan India, the Middle Eastern states and East Africa, including Kush, establishing official diplomatic relations with many of them. The Kingdom of Kush also traded directly with Ptolemaic Egypt, the Middle Eastern states, India and later with Rome itself, being one of the largest centers of steel production in the ancient world. The Kushites also actively waged wars against Ptolemaic Egypt, Rome and Persia, directly anchoring it in the same geopolitical sphere of influence. They built (modestly sized) pyramids, large Egyptian style temple complexes, complex urban centers, employed war elephants (sometimes imported from India), developed distinct writing systems and many more exciting things. Often overlooked in other games, the Kushites would really add some beautiful diversity to an already beautiful game. I believe the Ptolemaic faction should have more Hellenistic characteristics, and its current ancient Egyptian look, would suit the Kushites better, who copied many ancient Egyptian elements in their culture. If you managed to read through all that, congratulations. I thank you for your patience and interest. I’d like to reiterate that I know that many of my suggestions may not be feasible. I just wanted to share my personal dreams for 0 A.D. What I think would make this game one of the greatest in history J
    4 points
  2. Broken in 19043, autobuild from r19046, reverted in r19054, refs #3785. Triggering a new autobuild now.
    3 points
  3. Hi, I'm currently surrounded by Irish speakers (while I have a child in an Irish speaking school and know some of the teachers a little). I also have friends in Greece (including language teachers) and other countries. I worked as a musician/singer for ten years and have sold most recording equipment, but I have a Zoom H5 and good recording/editing software. Let me know if I can help with voices.
    2 points
  4. Basically, yes. I am imagining the AI being more concerned with controlling resources than killing the opponent. Like the saying in chess, "to take is a mistake", meaning that going after your opponent's pieces is often much less effective than concentrating on controlling territory. I am not suggesting that this should overwrite the current AI, I understand that many people enjoy the hectic "build and battle" dynamic similar to Starcraft, and even in my "pacifist" vision of the game there is room for erratic factions who just want to raid and pillage, but IMHO that shouldn't be the way most factions behave normally, they should be a little more cautious and self-preserving. I would like games to be quite long, several wars might be fought between the factions, interspersed with periods of peace, before the game is over. Maybe I am in the minority with this wish, but I've always wanted to play something that feels between Age of Empires and Civilisation in scope. Adding depth to the AI behaviour would allow for lots of different play styles and also new mechanics. For example, I've always thought it would be cool if instead of conducting diplomacy "magically" you actually had to send an emissary with a guard to negotiate peace and trade deals; can't really do that sort of thing if the AI attacks on sight. [edit] I shouldn't really say that the current method of diplomacy happens "magically", it is part of a "tabletop" paradigm where the players can interact with each other at any time, as if they were sat around a table together. Another paradigm could be that the player exists within the game world, either collectively as any of his/her units, or as a single unit that represents the player (like the king in chess); in this case the players' units would have to come into contact with each other to conduct diplomacy.
    2 points
  5. I can confirm that I have the bug fixed on my end, I'm just waiting for a formal report from someone on Windows and *nix that it works and that nothing is obviously broken, and then I can commit it. I need to check for repackaging options. There might be an easy-isa option, or I'll need to repackage the whole thing.
    2 points
  6. A mysterious civilization inhabits the jungles of 0 AD...
    2 points
  7. I've created some new maps for a22 to further improve selection and variety. These may need some minor fixing up, I'm still unskilled at map-making. You can find my maps here. There is also a ticket for this. Screenshots are provided for each map. African Plains African Wetseason Ambush-Frontier Artic Summer Artic Tundra Carthaginian Coast Danube Extinct Volcano India Polar Sea Ravines Strips Two Rulers(scenario)
    1 point
  8. Not sure whether anyone else has had this problem with the AUR package(s), and this is probably a package maintainer issue (or my local ability to apply AUR repo's properly is lacking, obviously) but I thought this might be interesting for folks who might run into this issue. I installed the AUR package and it seemed to not copy all the information/files from the package build/source directory to /usr/share/0ad-git/data/ where the program expects it to be. I had to do this manually (cp -rv ./data /usr/share/0ad-git/data) and now the game works smoothly. If this is irrelevant information for some reason, I apologise.
    1 point
  9. Pathfinding is super bad for some days now.
    1 point
  10. Sorry I wasn't paying super close attention, so I am not sure which Civ I was playing, but for my first spin on the game as a modestly experience AoM player, it was good. I do know that buying houses and a few other buildings was free. Buying lots of soldiers to do all the work will take getting used to though. On to the actual bug! One of the things (and the only issue I have experienced so far) I noticed almost immediately is that my Civic Center can be clicked a bit off of its actual graphic (maybe 10-20% of its size above the graphic). I wouldn't normally mind, especially since, at an educated guess, it appears that instead of having a custom clickmap for each Center, it appears that you just have a block set up for all of them (I haven't tested it extensively yet), but it interferes with rally point placement. I frequently place my rally point near my Center, so having the Center extend a bit up past its graphic is annoying. This is a pretty minor thing overall, and I don't know if it is a known issue yet. A glance at the first page of bugs told me it hasn't been posted about recently, and therefor probably not within this alpha release, considering that the posts extend back a couple months. Liking the game so far, though. It is clean and well built. Based on how well it is built, I would say it is pretty close to a 1.0 release. I don't actually know anything about how far in you are though, that's just my experience so far.
    1 point
  11. Hello. Lately one idea came to my mind about mercenaries. Its well known that they are expensive : cost iron, and cost more resourses in the total amount than its analogue(citizen) . That must be fixed and i got an idea how: let mercenaries gain 2x more exp per hit / kill. Thus, they can be promoted faster than normally wich makes them more usefull.
    1 point
  12. Regarding code and bridges: I actually believe a walkable mesh would be far easier to do than changing terrain. Changing terrain sports a number of drawbacks which I am very reluctant to get into. A walkable mesh would imply a new component, and tight integration to the pathfinder, but in itself nothing there sounds impossible, and would in theory allow ships and units. Since we cache the obstruction maps, nothing there is insane so long as the update isn't too difficult. We could also add gates to their sides and stuff. It would be a little slower, but it wouldn't be by that much. However, the pathfinding problems of gates still apply: closed bridges currently would be seen as utterly impassable. The feature is also not really that interesting, since most bridges won't be high enough to let ships through. Have to agree with draw bridges there (though how realistic are those for the time period?). I generally don't see handling height as relevant, that would just add passability classes for a super special case which is annoying.
    1 point
  13. It has yet been reported. It should have been fixed one or two days ago. Don't forget to recompile.
    1 point
  14. @Itms @feneur ------------ You can found help there. http://trac.wildfiregames.com/wiki/Audio_Voice_List abot Celts languages in 0A.D
    1 point
  15. I forgot report this, same here.
    1 point
  16. If it is Carthaginian coast, then why not the sea on the north and the land on the south? Maybe call it Libyan Coast or something. In generally, the names could have more historical and geographical flavor. African Plains -> Savanna or Serengeti would work. Extinct Volcano -> Maybe always put the volcano to one side of the map riather than always in the middle. This make the gameplay more distinct. India -> What part of India is this? Maybe rename to Gedrosia or Arachosia. Ravines -> Maybe rename to Petraea or Arabian Wadi. Also, make starting flat areas bigger please for the players.
    1 point
  17. The African and Artic maps are mainly there to add more set-biome maps, i feel we already have many random biome ones. Also they look interesting. We have few maps of dryer coasts(carthaginian, libyan, egyptian) so thats why Carthaginian Coast was created. Historically, control of it was important for protecting the Carthaginian trade routes. This map is similar to Phonecian Levant, might need some extra modifications. The Danube was historically an important river, seperating kingdoms and tribes. It being an easy frontier to defend, its shores were contested for. Also we have no maps with set autumn biome. India definitely needs some extras, but could be promising. In ancient times the Mauryan Empire warred with and conquered the tribes inhabiting this area. The Two Rulers features an archipelago in the Agean Sea. Ancient Greek city-states often only controlled 1 island and were also frequently at war with the neighbouring polis.
    1 point
  18. Also, I yhink 0 A.D.'s trash unit are relatively stronger than AOK's pikemen and skirmisher and scout trash and more useful, like spyth said.
    1 point
  19. This map is already playable, 1 vs 2. Athens vs Persians. It's a normal size map, tried no to add to much eyecandy stuff. There is still something left, as the background, some advices and additions on units and buildings, making some walls untargetable, plus more stuff. Units can walk on 'walls' (But those are just elevated terrain with walls in both sides, but they work!). As soon as i finished the entire 'agenda' of the map i will make the respective post. Units on 'walls' For now, if someone wants to give any advice, opinion, wants to play it or erase it, just leave a comment. Im not good at balancing The map As for the name of the map, i gladly receive suggestions. Siege.zip
    1 point
  20. They can be, as long as someone is willing to make a faction out of them.
    1 point
  21. They're not quite done yet, but they're close. Sorry, I can't help but tease haha
    1 point
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