While reading the endless "ProGui" promoters and detractors posts in this forum, an idea came back to my mind.
I think ProGui gives an advantage to low level and mid level players by assisting their boom (requiring less attention for the training, and leaving more attention available for other tasks). While you could think of it like a negative (which in many cases is), it has a "good" aspect, which is that lower level players can now participate in higher level games, something that is especially welcomed now that 0AD has lost so many old players.
This reminded me of a feature AOE2 has, which is the possibility of adjusting the "handicap" of each player. This adjustment is basically a multiplier on resources collected for that individual player. For example, if you give a player a 20% handicap, he will get 20 more resources for every 100 resources collected. If I am not mistaken, this is the exact same mechanism PetraBot difficulty levels are implemented.
Vinme was complaining that he had no players of his level to play 1v1s against. And many of us can often either not fill a TG, or find suitable 1v1 opponents.
I think, if added to 0AD, this handicap adjustment (per player) might make balances possible when currently they are not. They would promote lower level players joining higher level games (and the opposite can also happen). They would allow more 1v1s and team games to be played, and reduce the waiting time before games can be started.
Graphically, I think the handicap percentage should be shown in the row of each player in the pre-game screen. 0% handicap should be the default, and the host should be able to change it. Before starting, everybody should be able to see this percentage next to each player name, as we can see the team number and civilization chosen currently.
Maybe someone can tell here if this could be developed as a mod first to test it, or it has to be hardcoded into the game engine right away, to be able to work.
What you think about this idea?