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I have read the interesting discussion about moving farm fields away from civic center and I agree with some points of view of both sides. However, it seems to me that many of them at least somewhat depend on the time period (phase) of the game. Based on that I got an idea which in my opinion could both make the game a bit more realistic and create interesting new strategies. The idea consists of two parts. The first is that the civic center would have three different instances with different characteristics. What follows is only a suggestion and its main goal is to illustrate the idea. Village phase: the civic center is all-in-one building, basically as it is now, meaning that it would have the functionality of a drop site for all resources, defensive character, able to train citizens Town phase: the civic center could have mostly technological importance (it seems to me that some civ dependent technologies would be best), it is a drop site for only "expensive" resources (metal and possibly stone and meat), has defensive role (with possibly fewer arrows with more damage), trains citizens but not cavalry anymore City phase: the civic center has mostly territorial importance, does not work as a drop site at all, can only train female and one citizen soldier, looses most (or even all) of its defensive abilities The second part is that the more sophisticated civic centers would require "better" surroundings. For example, there would have to be a market and a temple nearby for the civic center to by in the last phase. Each building could e.g. have a "nice aura" with temple being positive and storehouse being negative. Hence the limit of n buildings required for the next phase could be removed. There could even coexist civic centers from different phases so that you could rule one city and one village while each of them would have its special traits. In that way there could be a very dense and simple society at the beginning and a sophisticated society with at least somewhat realistic city center at the end and it would present the player with the choice of placing the farms next to the civic center knowing that they would have to build a new one somewhere else or demolish the farms to get the upgraded civic center OR build the farms away from the civic center at the beginning. And because this is my first post here, let me thank you for this already great game

So basically: Give a tree HP and a death animation and you're good to go. It would totally ruin your gameplay, however.

how many weeks since this post was opened and not a single tangible solution? Mistakes were made? Yes. The errors of 24 have been improved, that's where we are. I honestly like the mechanics of A24 more than how horrible A23 was. Is it going to be unbalanced? Obviously, it is a game in development. People can stay on A23 if they want to, but many of the complainers don't propose anything, don't patch, don't test SVN, don't appear in The phabricator. How is it possible that we take them into account if they do not make a minimum effort?

Finally joined wildfiregames! So a few days ago i played with Atlas and somehow made a decent map. Hopefully this will gave some inspiration to other map makers and so the community will continue to thrive. This game is really something unique that you can't find anywhere else! Man i love what you have done with 0ad 24 so far! Whatever i upload is the property of 0ad/wildfiregames. /fishyfish moba_demo_v2.zip

Not sure how much this would change. As the CC is still the most defended area, I believe people will just build like this: Only depended if 8 fields are aromatically spawned (left) or if you get a reduced price for placing a field close to the farmstead (right).

My post always has a reason, and an introduction that tells that reason. I have seen many complain about the rush. Why don't we create a meta where can some strategies be predefined? AoE have their own rushes. I tried to implement as suggestions, a bit the slinger rush. I'm also in favor of an Archer rush and a scout rush (if we can agree on that unit / class it should be in the game). How should we implement a rush? Our game is asymmetric, not all civs should access the same rushes in a certain way. Factions / Civs should not access the Archer rush or Cavalry rush. At least in the early game. Nations with archery potential, from the days that they have the technologies, to do as archery tradition, should it. On the other hand, A generic rush for most would be with scouts (Cavalry) Others with sword infantry rush. We should allocate technologies to focus on the 3 basic strategies. -Rushing -Booming -Turtling Every player will think ... hummm I chose this faction to performance a rush of archers. In phase one there should be technologies to unlock defenses and for the civic center to defend itself (without garrison units), , in compensation they should have a price and time enough to choose between economical and rush technologies. Each phase should have its own kind of rush, this encourages further development of the faction. Our tech tree in the game is not developed and does not compare to that of AOE, even Delenda is surpasses us. (Without discrediting Wowgetoff's work ...)

Just change nothing here

Thank you your opinion. I would like to just clarify few things. each instance of the CC would have to look different - exactly not to confuse players the advancement into a new phase would not have to automatically change the CC, it could just unlock the new instance and just like a sentry tower can be converted into a stone tower the CC could be converted (if conditions satisfied) or a new one of the higher instance could be built. as I have imagined the idea it would be a forever change at least in the sense that the CC would never downgrade which might not have been clear I see the different phases as the transformation of the society and as the society being build around different structures (here represented by buildings). You transform the biggest farmstead in the village (CC of village phase) in to a senate building (CC of city phase) and while loosing the possibility to store thing there you gain influence in your region (territory). I might be completely wrong about the historical background for this and I will gladly learn from anyone better educated on this topic. Nevertheless, in the presented idea I have seen a potential to keep the beginning of the game simple while keeping the player from storing resources in the Agora which probably was not the case.

Everybody can win from multiple cultures - also in gaming. The art works you guys do, are really impressive!

I think Seleucids would be the best for beginners. I consider rushing not a strategy suited to beginners, so I would recommend a civ that has the tools to crack a defense. Seleucids seem to be the best for that. They have pikemen, cavalry archers, cataphracts with more HP, good siege&elephants and their military colonies are nice too. The thing why I would recommend them over Ptolemies is their champion swordsmen which prevents a weakness to rams.

Note it was made faster by wraitii to prevent dancing.

To say this release has been rushed is a little ridiculous on it's own to be honest.

Hi all, I'm working on a City Building mod. This mod is trying to incorporate elements of city building games like Caesar or SimCity to 0 A.D. The end goal here is to have a RTS/city building hybrid mod using 0 A.D engine. The balance between the two genres that I'm trying to achieve here is to ensure that the city building part should be fun enough without getting too complicated. The plan I've made consists of several phases, each with different features to implement. But currently I'm focusing on two mechanics: I. Building placement In city building games, building placement is important. Especially housing zone. People will only live in your city if their needs are met. Job, food, desirable location. Otherwise they will leave. Resource and storage building placement is also important, finding sweet spots to shorten the route without disturbing existing residences. Since this is still a RTS game, effects need to be tweaked in such a way that normal player can play the game without crippling penalty, but player who takes time to plan the city can optimize it to gain edge. Implementation: Every building has aura that indicates their desirability, which will increase or decrease population count of nearby houses, e.g. civic building increasing nearby house population, military building decreasing it. Since resource management is already complicated in 0AD, alternative implementation is using building aura to increase performance of related nearby building, e.g mining dropsite increase nearby blacksmith research speed, blacksmith increase nearby barrack training speed, etc. This will cause crowds of buildings in desirable area, so to justify it every building is implied to have been constructed along with its nearby infrastructure, increasing nearby unit speed. Status & TODO: Released, but with general rule. These are the desired changes and their detailed implementations. A complete explanation of Phase I and download link is posted here. II. Economy In city building games, money is usually the only resource the player needs to build the city. It can be gathered from each citizen, or received by importing resources to other cities. Implementation: New resource available to simulate productions. Money: House and Economic buildings trickle money periodically. The amount of taxes will be influenced with the same rule as Phase I. The trickle should be low enough that player should spend responsibly, but should also be high enough so that it's not the first resource to run out before other resources. Money should be requirement of every building and unit creation, as it is analogous to builder/soldier salary. Weapon: Blacksmith will be available to construct in town phase and trickles weapon over time. This will be used to train soldiers. It would consume wood and metal, so wood and metal resource for unit training can be removed and replaced with only food, money, and weapon. Training time should also be made faster. Working animal: Horses/Elephant is trickled resources as well. Useful to train cavalry. Status: In progress. Money has been proven to be workable, but still tweaking 0AD GUI to support more than 4 resources. Weapon and Working animal is still being researched. TODO: Test other impacts of new resources, finding out other uses of money, learning about Summary screen (after battle) GUI as it is bugged out on Resource Tab. III. Citizens City building has NPCs that simulates production chain and distribution. To enhance the experience several new citizen types can be created that work like modified Trader but between resource dropsite and market/house/blacksmith. This is still in research phase. Feel free to criticize or ask if any of these doesn't make sense/needs work/impossible to implement in 0 A.D. I still have a lot to learn in modding 0 A.D, any feedback is welcome. I will keep updating this post if there's a new idea to share. Thank you.

To be honest I am very happy with how CCs and Kleroukhia work right now. Please don't change anything.

Chinese cataphracts:

@Ulrich You can also queue actions. If I'm invaded I like my soldiers to drop off their resources and then attack. (The dropped off resources might help with new buildings or troops, while when soldiers are killed carrying stuff you not only lose it, but the enemy also gets more loot.)

As a rule of thumb no. You need the dev version to play with another dev version. And they must be the exact same revision. Or things will break. Most likely you'll be OOS instantly.

What do people think of the Empire Earth way to do it? In that game you build a granary and 8 fields spawn around it. That would be different from placing it around the CC. We could have a feature were you could place fields individually or for a reduced price with a granary. The transparent grey building in the middle of the fields is the granary.

Are you suggesting that CC's don't expand your territory automatically when phasing up? I am not sure if anyone would choose to 'upgrade' their cc in this way in a competitive match because one would need the arrows from the CC to deter enemy infantry, meanwhile the CC can serve as a dropsite for resources, which is convenient. The resource we are after could be any one of wood, stone or metal, although most likely metal in A24 games. Arrows in their home CC is also important to shorten Gaul naked fanatics rush and ranged cavalry rushes; without arrows these rushes would go on forever. Why we build extra CC: 1. To reach for resources. We build it close to the resource we want and use it as dropsite + labour force supplier. Therefore its dropsite function is important. 2. Get closer to an enemy. Pocket players often build a CC next to a border player so that troops can be produced close to the battlefield and reinforcements arrive promptly. If the CC can train units then that saves us the time and resources to build an extra barrack.

Just around farmhouses would not help that much, as you then can just build the farmstead close to the CC. So you would have to add a minimal distance between CC and farmstead, which is just a more complicated way of using a minimal distance between CC and fields.

Ah ok CS was citizen soldiers desculpa

Done.

Well that is a shame , at the moment when you make a syntagma , the phalangites just spread out like normal and i was expecting a bit more going forward but oh well.

Welcome young child. The Holy Church of the Beaver Absolves you of your sins. In all seriousness. Personally, i dislike your idea of Changing the role of the City Center every Phase. It's not a bad idea, but it definitely would not fit in a game like this. Not unless several extreme changes were made to adapt to such things. As it is, it's best to have it as the all-in-one thing forever. If you want to change anything, it should be a forever change, not an as-you-advance thing. That would be too confusing for new players and make too many Cheek strategy's evolve. I like the whole Having one city-center in different areas thing, like actually making them "City-Centers" Instead of just I'mTerritoriesAndTrainsWomens Buildings. We could also tie this in with DE's idea of being allowed to build buildings outside of territories instead of just outposts. (but still degrade over time, of course) This would make building towns less difficult, Those circular territory things can be a pain sometimes. And also have them be much father away from each other (which would make city placement a strategy of itself!) Also making building further away from your territory would mean more loss of HP for your buildings would be good too. The aura stuff is a full-blown-no from me. 0AD is not a city building game. If you want something like that i can suggest a few Also about the Farming stuff, i think it should be kept Simple. Either put them wherever you want, or just around farmhouses. The latter would also help in the (Yet-to-be-developed) Animal Housing building which you can herd animals into and have an infinite food source at a steady rate. Farms being better of course, but requiring more effort (I.E People)

The problem with changing training times is that it does nothing to fix the fundamental issue. Barracks serve a primarily economic role in the Village Phase. Some people might not consider that a problem, but to me, the average Athenian just getting equipped to serve for the military doesn't say to himself, "Whelp, better start hoeing those fields." Introducing a gather-rate penalty of some sort to units trained in the barracks would generally fix this problem. Suddenly booming would otherwise be done by researching fertility festival and training women or going with a suboptimal investment that would leave the player better protected at the cost of efficiency. And there you go. Booming would not be turtling.

Hello everyone, i didnt know where to report this so I posted it here. please help getting my points from him, he closed a rated 1v1 after saying gg and getting deafeated even with his own clown settings, please see the replay files. Thanks. commands.txt metadata.json

Let's say there are approximatively 300 tree variations. (650 files in gaia, minus the rocks, plus the files not named tree, minus bushes, minus tree leaves) If we wanted to do it the the art way, you'd have to change those 300 files to have various animations, maybe one or two. Some trees are made of multiple parts e.g can come under the form of three palm trees. If we wanted to do it the programming way, the problem would be that three would look weird when falling because it has no roots. To fix that you need new art which 300 new roots. As for death damage the engine already supports it for living units, but not really for resources because they do not have HP and as such can't die. You could do it like sheep however, and have the death deal death damage, then play the falling animation. Relevant discussions. https://trac.wildfiregames.com/wiki/List%3A_Entities%3A_Nature%3A_Flora%3A_Plants#TREESTUMPS https://trac.wildfiregames.com/ticket/1017 https://wildfiregames.com/forum/topic/15322-need-blender-help-please/?tab=comments#comment-228892 https://wildfiregames.com/forum/topic/20290-falling-trees/?do=findComment&comment=311983 https://wildfiregames.com/forum/topic/35725-tree-stumps/?do=findComment&comment=415025 https://wildfiregames.com/forum/topic/24628-flora-agriculture-related-ideas-and-requests/?do=findComment&comment=358975

This is neat. I like it a lot. Pretty cool too. Too bad about the farmland getting put inside forests.

Yeah, stone "mines" can look like quarries or something like this:

Redpillled anonbro

.... It does not matter if we add or not. We will finish doing it anyway.

Hey, good choice of terrains and assets! Using a MOBA style map as inspiration is a good idea. Attack lanes, sneaks, etc., are generally signs of a good map.

those buildings look really nice! germanic longhouses had the entrance on the side and were split into two halfes with people living on the one side and animals on the other. They were long and big in size and with the roof nearly until the ground. I think this could be a nice special building (like the appartment buildings of the romans or carthagians), with a bigger population bonus and animal corral combined. Also I noticed the chicken coop/ henhouse on stilts (like in the background on those pictures). Would be a nice addition too. It would give individuality to the germanics but I understand if it breaks the balance/ scale..

Electrophile (loves electrons / negative charges) Nucleophile (loves positive charge) Hydrophile (loves water) Philopator (loves their dad) hmmmmmmm?

Why does Antiochus always score 100% in his tests? Because he is Antiochus the Righteous! He is always right!

Guess the Spartans shouldn't have called them "The Village People" before...

One day you thought you'd booked some gospel musicians, but instead a group of Carthaginian spearmen turned up in full armour. "And who the hell are you guys?!!!" you exclaimed. Their leader just looked up and said: "The Sacred Band!"

capturable ruins.

Some of us like roleplaying to play.

It's not just historical reality, it doesn't make any sense at all.

Which is exactly why my original proposal was to split the civiv center functionality (see top post). Defensive buildings do the defense, the farmstead is for storing food and the storehouse is for storage other resources. But it seems this is not the preferred option, which is why I included other options in the discussion. To the problems with petra: this is a second problem that needs to be fixed. If its worth it depends if you like a more realistic city layout. There are some people who would like that (again, see top post) but also people who are ok with the current unrealistic layout. I am just wondering why so many areas of the game are closely based on history, but the standard build order involves that the heart of the cities are turned into one giant farming area. And again: the goal is not to make the game hyper-realistic. With the right solution we don't have to sacrifice a fun gameplay. The goal is to find a solution that is fun, but looks better/ and is more realistic than the status quo.

I agree with the debuffs part. Fields built near the Civic Centre having an arbitrary malus to collection makes little sense. That said, having some ground be more fertile to incentivise players to farm in those areas makes sense and adds another layer to the area control aspect of the game.

I tried removing dropsite from CC for a while in DE, but I found myself annoyed that I couldn't use it as such. I might try it again and see.

Zapotecs version 0.1 Based heavily upon the great work being done by the Terra Magna mod team The Zapotec lived in the Valley of Oaxaca, the largest expanse of relatively flat land in southern Mexico. Around 500 B.C.E. they built Monte Albán on the flattened top of a mountain in the center of the valley, the first urban center in Mesoamerica. Monte Albán covered an area of 2.5 square miles and its population grew from 5,000 to 25,000. It boasted the first centralized political system and population divided into social classes. Lasting for about a 1,000 years it became the dominant power in southern Mexico, ruled by nobles and strong military. Lacking in a strong agricultural base, their economy was based on the collection of tribute from surrounding groups. By the 7th century C.E. its power began to wane through competition and unsustainable population growth. Other characteristic features of Zapotec civilization can be found in the periods following Monte Albán's founding, including a characteristic two-chambered temple architecture, a market system, a rubber-ball game, and the human-like funerary vessels called Zapotec urns. Between 200 - 900 C.E. Monte Albán acquired a Classic style representative of Mesoamerican groups, most likely through conquest. Population growth, writing, architecture and art flourished, centering around the noble class and the hierarchy of Zapotec gods. Units Civic Center Zapotec Citizen Male and Female variations. Some textures and meshes by @Lopess Jaguar King (Hero) Nearby Soldiers are stronger and move faster. Nearby Citizens and Slaves gather much faster. Battle Priest (Hero) Reduces the effectiveness of nearby enemy units, due to his terrifying visage (Battle Priests wear the skin of their enemies) Has a healing aura for nearby Zapotec units as well as a strong self-healing ability. Barracks Zapotec Runner Lightly armed Scout unit Can Hunt Can build Outposts Zapotec Spearman Macuahuitl Infantry Archery Range Zapotec Slinger Zapotec Skirmisher Zapotec Archer Archery Tradition tech gives them greater accuracy and -50% xp required for promotion Fortress Zapotec Noble Warrior Champion Macuahuitl Warrior Mercenaries Mixtec Jaguar Warrior Mercenary Champion Spearman Very much like the Gaesetae Naked Fanatic for the Gauls Otomi Maceman Mercenary Maceman A small Crush attack Teotihuacan Warrior Mercenary Multi-purpose Warrior An extra fast ranged unit, similar to a Cavalry Archer or Cavalry Skirmisher in ability Can swap between atlatl-thrown javelins and a (melee) heavy spear Others War Captive Slave class unit, trained from Storehouses and Farmsteads Zapotec Priest Battering Ram War Canoe Fires arrows and can fish for food. Trade Canoe Zapotec Structures Zapotecs have average-strength structures with an average number of structure technologies and upgrades. They have no access to cavalry, so do not have a Cavalry Stable. Their "Cult Statue" glory trickle building is the Ball Court. Only 1 is buildable, but it gives a trickle of glory 4x greater than a regular Cult Statue from a different civ. The Wonder gives a trickle of glory as well and can be praised by units for more glory. They have a greater reliance on stone for technologies, and a less reliance on metal compared to other civs. Lastly, they start each skirmish match with a free extra stone mine nearby. Atlatl can be a special technology. Adds range and accuracy for Javelin infantry. Eventual the Maya will get this special tech too. More References

Well obviously we support level 1. Level 2 is easy enough. Level 3 would need some new code. We'll probably get there eventually, but can't say anything on the when.

4 resources - AOE II ripoff city phases - AOE II ripoff Blacksmith/technology system - AOE II ripoff "counter" system - AOE II ripoff Combined with a @#$% game pace. But yeah, using a squad based system is a ripoff... So what? IT's not about whether the system was used by another game at point X in the past. It's about creating a concept, using various tools to make the whole game itself unique. Currently 0 ad has what absolutely, unique and OUTSTANDING gameplay element? Ah yea, soldiers can gather resources.. wooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooow So units can do the most boring task in the game to not be idle. Impressive.

Just like in TW. Build a battalion, fight with a battalion, individual soldiers can die and can be healed / reinforced at your barracks. Battalions get experience as a whole for fighting, and if the last soldier was killed the battalion is lost. Reinforcing a battalion costs less than to train a new one. If you dont know games with squad based unit systems, here are some examples: Company of Heroes Battle for Middle earth C&C 3+ Praetorians Warhammer 40k games (DoW 1,2,3) There might be mroe but those are the ones that come into my mind atm. And once more: soldiers_do_not_gather. Soldiers_fight. That's what soldiers are used for.

He actually sums the point up pretty well. Reinforcing troops can be accomplished in many ways. Either automatically when nearby a barracks, or in owned territory. Alternatively for resources with a timer and so on. This doesn't really have to do with logics, it only depends on how much effort is put in the reinforcement mechanism coding. I'd suggest you actually look how battalion gameplay concepts are realized in other games.

Best design/gameplay concept for 0 A.D. I have read so far. Would totally go for it!

To put a quick reference: Age of Mythology only allowed civic expansion on certain spots of the map. IIRC correctly this was done to reduce the Town Center spam from it's predecessor, AoE II, where Town Centers were built nearby all kinds of resources, especially gold and stone, to quickly harvest those resources and boom the economy. A similar different concept are the expansion gold mines in Warcraft III and the mineral mines in Starcraft. To prevent players from simply sending out their first soldiers to expand everywhere, Warcraft III used a neutral creep system. The creeps were hostile to every player and had to be killed in order to take control of the gold mine. The creeps were a variety of unique unit types like ogres, trolls and other fantasy creatures and provide heroes with experience points and gold to buy items. This way, even if not taking control of the gold mine with an expansion was worth it as it makes the player's army stronger. On top of that there's a natural progression to get players fighting. The maps are symmetric, and creep strength increases the closer they are to the center of the map.If both players fight creeps on their side of the map they'll meet their enemy eventually, creating a natural transition from fighting neutral units -> fighting the other player. Of course, it's possible to attack players directly and ignore the creeps, but this is a choice of the player and has advantages and drawbacks. BFME also used neutral creatures like trolls, spiders, Orcs or Wargs to protect settlement points. Starcraft did not require neutral creeps, since the unit production is much faster and it's a lot easier to destroy enemy bases even early in the game. Also, base defense mechanics are less present in Starcraft than Warcraft. If 0 ad featured neutral provinces, it would be interesting to have somethiing like this aswell. A province would consist of a small small city or village that native to the map that the players are fighting on and hostile towards them. - small provinces: feature additional free food, like herdables and berries or fields, wood and a single bonus resource like stone or iron. They only are guarded by armed peasants are are an easy target to provide experience for the player's soldiers and heroes - medium provinces: feature free food, wood and additionally a larger pile of resources that are scarce, like stone and silver, or iron and silver. The province is protected by a decent sized, basic garrison army that cannot be beaten by only a couple of soldiers. - large provinces: like medium provinces, but feature even more resources. The garrison consists of experienced soldiers which are hard to take on. To prevent maps to be overburdened with neutral units everywhere, I think the provinces should be connected to map size. Tiny, small and medium maps only feature a couple of small provinces and maybe a maximum of one medium province, while large and gigantic maps also offer large and medium provinces. Since large maps usually feature many players, working together to bring provinces under control becomes easier. Apart from this there are also resource spots that do not belong to anyone, so even in case a player missed his opportunity to take control of provinces he still has a chance to harvest "advanced" resources. One thing I'm unsure about is whether this works decently with random map scripts. The games that use this kind of system usually have pre-defined maps, where neutral units, buildings and expansions are always the same. Actually, it might be not that hard: Simply use the map creation algorithm from player starting locations, and add (depending on map size) for example 3 neutral starting locations and switch the owning player to gaia/hostile. The player starting locations need a pre-defined distance from each other anyways, so this could work. i.e. the map has an inital property that defines it as "northern". The spawning file then places Gaul warriors and a civic center. While a map like Latium spawns roman warriors or Iberians (as a sort of replacement for etruskians) or something like that. Just to put an example. I'd like to hear the opinions of a RMS creator regarding this.