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Apart from the definition - wouldn't it be good to just anounce for each players which mods are being used in a game? Cheating means also using an advantage and not visible/usable for others. (This is obviously still leaving headroom for covert cheats buried into something else, but I am afraid that tehere is no such thing as abolute protection) I'd like to propose putting all the energy that goes into such discussions into gameplay development instead .

I'm not sure if a technology can change something like the standard, but I think that would be a really nice touch. I feel like a standard bearer unit would be a bit redundant with the animated standard when using formations no? Plus, we already have the centurion for the romans, so its hard to imagine a gameplay role for them too. That being said, it might be useful for campaign development/cinematics.

A GUI mod should not change the way the game works underneath, only the way you graphically interface with it. Yes, but you are forgetting that the spirit of competition drives one player to be better than another and that as a direct result, players with high APM do better than players that cannot keep up. This is inescapable. Automation generally is not the solution because it just decreases the number of actions a player can do, which flattens the learning curve. Instead, the ways in which an action can be better than another action, strategic options, should be increased. This allows one players fewer, smarter actions to have more of an impact. I'm trying to help with this last part

That's the style of m7600 who is no longer part of these forums.

again, this is correct. You make solid points, just not any that counter the fact that those mods are cheating. Like, autociv is brilliant for its lobby changes (automatically assigning civs, pressing tab to cycle through all different names that start with the same letter, pingall restrictions and /link), its building hotkeys should probably be added to the base game, as should the panel that shows all spectators. But as good as the mod and its impact on the "0ad ecosystem" are, it's still a cheat. You cant just say "Mod xy is good for 0ad, thus it cant be a cheat". Also, cheating isnt even bad. Like, ive cheated in so many singleplayer games and casual multiplayer games its uncountable. If I look at my siblings screen while playing AoE2 FFA, thats cheating. But who cares, its fun. The only argument why autociv might not qualify as cheating while proGUI does, is precisely that so many people use it. If it becomes the norm, then, according to wikipedia, it ceases to be cheating: "Cheating in video games involves a video game player using various methods to create an advantage beyond normal gameplay," Huh. I guess I did not think about that. It sounds reasonable, considering many people like to have a very "clean" image and expressing interest in a cheat sounds bad if you come from more competitive games... That leaves me in a bit of a precarious situation, as I dont like to lie/whitewash something I truly believe to be a cheat, but also dont want to stop anybody from using autociv or proGUI. What would you call a mod that is not suitable for competitive play, but acceptable in a more casual environment? Just "uncompetitive mod"?

Be careful with this. You have better hardware than me, e.g. better mouse, stronger GPU, so you get more FPS than me. I am nerfed by lag and you have an advantage over me so you are cheating. Autociv gives you a stats panel. The enhanced GUI mods are ugly but just having cube trees and grass raise my skill by at least 300. But jagsus plays worse with cube trees because he finds it mentally discomforting. Some like to see new icons whereas some want uniform icons from A23. If GUI mods are really only GUI levels then it's really just the same as enabling some graphics options in the settings.

Alright, I'll just leave like that, maybe someone wants to pick it up in the future :) I'm not sure I could do it myself

The problem is that now, anybody using it is a cheater, and that, also the mod is disgraced beside being a very good mod, that add legitimate improvements to interface with the game... I think/hope that's not you aim for, but you can see why having a definition that both fit the intent and have a very define description could be worth considering over your wider definition. Also, if a mod is labeled cheat then very very few players would be interested into getting it, despite that they could actually like it. Cheats are often used when you are about to drop a game and you want quick satisfaction, mods get you to explore new ways to play it. I try to only promote moderngui to players who describe a wish for a feature that is specifically in the mod, and if another smaller mod have a similar feature, then I'll promote it instead, but I know for a fact that players who heard for the first time that a mod is a cheat is very unlikely to ever try it (permanent effect) compared to a player who heard about it as a mod will very likely do. I'm kinda over it now if some people want to call it cheat, I'm just replying to you @TheCJ since you seems more in a constructive approach, I don't want to get to personal about this @#$% anymore

This thread is going on with ""progui"" quoted every single comment but with none of the participant actually ever tried it right? The gui mod have orders of magnitude more clickable buttons and displayed stats the vanilla one, so don't worry, those who dare to use it probably won't lack stimulation lol. Yet, in my experience, most user wrap their head around how to use the features and read the stats pretty quickly. It's not particularly impressive, but good UX was what drove it's development all along. Commercially, UX refer both to ease of use, or reading of data AND user satisfaction because it's never considered that limitations can make any user better off. It's been improved over a lineage of mods, merged plenty of ideas from a variety of folks. Even for the parts I did, a tone of it was inspired by feedback and suggestions, or merging other mods. The result is arguably, a good layer of improvements to the gui, and a new way to experience the game, your way (tones of options, also coming from suggestions and requests). @WiseKind consider trying it. ModernGUI tread

Its contradicting to say this is "your definition" of a real-time game and then follow up with this: As, according to the definition you gave, most forms of chess are actually real-time. As are basically all turn-based strategy games I have played. Sure, there might be some day-spanning "mobile games", but for most video games, you dont just leave for any amount of time. I guess the only way "your definition" makes sense is if you have a different definition of "must" aswell. I dont have to be present in the first minute of a 0ad game, I will just lose if I'm not there. As is the case in chess. If you spend 5min of the 8min you have for your game on the toilet, you will lose by time. Also, you don't get to define what "real-time" means in this context. Neither do I. According to wikipedia, "Real-time strategy (RTS) is a subgenre of strategy video games that does not progress incrementally in turns,[1] but allow all players to play simultaneously, in 'real time.'" So "real-time" means all players can do things simultaneously. Now, as there are myriad options on what each player can do over the course of a game and there are (on average) up to 200 units to control, plus 10 or more production buildings, plus 2 to 8 buildings with technologies, it is quite obvious that, by design, a player that can do more things simultaneously will have an advantage. That is the nature of RTS games. If player 1 can execute the same strategy (give the same orders) as player 2, but in a shorter time, he has "free time" in which he can do something "extra" or just think about his next move, precisely because the game is real-time and they play simultaneously. Your opinion, that the "input speed" of the players shouldn't matter and players should be allowed to install as many mods to reduce how often they have to click goes directly against the challenge of simultaneous gameplay. RTS players generally want that the player that can execute more meaningful actions in the same time wins. And that means either the player whose actions are more meaningful, or the player who can make more actions that are as meaningful. If proGUI actually just restarted autoqueue, if wouldnt have brought about such a reaction. As far as I understood, you can tell proGUI (through some button or something) "I want 50% slingers and 50% spearman, but do not use my food if I have only 200 left". Then it will automatically produce units from all your barracks, while keeping the batches as big as possible, without letting your food drop below 200. This is much different than a button to restart autoqueue. ... It also stays captivating and interesting by forcing the player to keep an eye on many different places at once, demanding quick reactions and great multitasking abilities, having the player learn that they can't just do one thing and wait for the results, but do many things at once to optimize their empire and elevate their skills. Indeed, those things are not the same. But consider: If you cant concentrate on/keep track of many things, a high APM will not be of any use to you. This is a natural limitation. Many meaningless actions cannot counter one meaningful action. On the other hand, if you have a high concentration and are able to think of all the things that need to be done at once, but you can't keep up with it, because you are too slow physically, you can always just, train more (and get faster) or think more and get better at prioritizing the truly important actions. It is not impossible to be a world-class RTS player with low APM. Not in AoE2 and even less so in 0ad. That doesnt mean we should just remove this challenge (that players should learn to prioritize or get quicker).

@SneakEP is becoming op at commentary! The stutter and camera shakes are kinda EXTREME thoughts.... RIP.. Could also be used to illustrate an issue/motivate the a27 relaunch.

Update: Autociv 27.0.3 has been released: https://github.com/nanihadesuka/autociv/releases Features: Additional counters for total mobilisable military, melee, range, KD ratio A page in options to adjust update frequency and the counters that you want to see

Could you name three historical figures from any pre-columbian civilizations who lived during the time-frame 500 BC to 100 AD?

Across all domains, the very opposite is true. New power tools enrich any discipline. Obviously it stands true to 0ad where teaching yourself to make a repetitive task, isn't hard or challenging, but just take space for you to think, or try new things. You or others admitted this was the main unfair advantage that it provides earlier. If ever you switch off the auto-trainer, you retain the new technics you had the brain space to try out : so the learning curve actually got UNflattened. For the other points, I already replied elsewhere so I'm done here with the thread.