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eh

@Nescio: I agree with you. But "alpha". I can be ok with Increase "pikeman pierce damage from 3.0 to 5.0 " even with "Increase pikeman pierce damage from 3.0 to 10.0" but also with "Decrease pikeman pierce damage from 3.0 to 1.5 ". All that are experiments. I would like to see many (even conflicting) experiments. The matter is to decide what is worth to experiment and what isn't. The good news is that in any private mod or in any shared mod we can do those experiments. For the 'public mod' the main constraint is to keep a clean state where we can develop things. (If we don't have a full tree of technologies, it's also perhaps because it's a bit early to finish that without all the requested features. That's the easy and nice part of the job). At least, it's my personal point of view. Discussing about all that is a bit complicated as often people have too much biases. I already said that somewhere but I don't try to contribute/develop my own game. I just try to contribute to the creation of @Wijitmaker and rip Ken Wood, taking into account all what was discussed meanwhile. The main issue currently is just to let people actually do their task.

My quip about the random maps is that they are indicative of a much larger issue, in that there is no coherent game concept anymore for 0 A.D. Empires Ascendant. I would much rather have 10 well-designed, balanced, and beautiful random map scripts that form a coherent theme with the game, than have 1000 random maps of extremely variable quality and no relation to each other. Empires Ascendant Everything should form around that concept. Ancient cultures clashing in order to make their empire reign supreme. How did they fight? Where did they colonize? How can you capture that feel and make a fun game in the process? And yes, it does seem like every single design decision, and I mean significant design decision, requires a UN Security Council resolution in order to proceed. No offense to @shieldwolf23, because he seems like a good guy, but his kumbaya suggestion where there's this grand meeting of the minds is bound to fail. You'd be taking decisions away from the Security Council and giving them to the General Assembly, where factions will form and lines drawn in the sand. No bueno. While it is beneficial to create such a wish list, I think you will agree Darc that a real coherent concept must be decided first, then features can be chosen in order to convey that concept. I would wager such wish lists have been created by the team before. And then a new set of volunteer devs come along, scrap the old wish list or don't even know it exists, and create a new wish list, all while not having or agreeing to even the general concepts these gameplay items are supposed to support. Both Darc and I presented strong, coherent, complementary game concepts many many months ago. Those threads are dead. In the vacuum created by no coherent design, multiple mods sprang up to try to improve the game. And it's true: my mistake was trying to develop alongside SVN. But doing so made it clearer to me that there's no there there. And this isn't a knock against the programmers. Hey, coders gonna code. But when are designas gonna design? Right now, the game is only cosmetically conveying its theme and feels more like a bad Starcraft clone with Rise of Nations' territory concept tacked on. And what design there is being done is in service of "balancing" a game that doesn't even know what it is yet.

I like the look of those big ol tower shields

(Perhaps also people shouldn't spread rumors like there is nobody who do that, there is no clear vision, there is no design doc and so on. Lies become true when they are said too often. Divide et impera.)

More 0AD tonight! Still a little on the sick side but getting better, and fingers crossed the same goes for my 0AD skills too https://www.twitch.tv/chaffcommandercoffey

By the way thanks for streaming. I don't think there are much 0ad twitch streams these days. That brings attention and hopefully some new faces will emerge.

I can't resist.

This is a very relevant point, and also the reason why I think it's so important to attract (much) more people to 0AD. I'm really not expecting 10 people to implement the entire design-document and manage the slew of daily user-requests, all on their free time. I think attracting more people can be done "relatively easily" by updating the main web-site, especially using much better screenshots than the ones that are there now. Video-editing features can be used more often to make pretty "short-video's" introducing all of the civ's in a 45sec. format for example.. Creating a development report every month/two months doesn't seem too much work to do, but essential to maintaining interest (it gives people something to look forward to, in between releases). There used to be these cool weekly development reports on the main site (I totally loved them), but every week is clearly overkill.. There needs to be some kind of "PR-department" creating/managing/planning promotional materials so that, for example, pretty screenshots, or concept art created by lordgood can be featured, new models like stanislass' Thracians or alaexander and lion's Xiognu minifaction can be shown off, or code improvements explained and new mods can be presented. This "PR-team" should have access to the official website/facebook/youtube/twitter/instagram acoounts and update at least once a week (if only with a single screenshot), and contact important gaming-sites ahead of every realese. These relatively low investments of time and effort, that don't even need to be handled by the development team (maybe just reviewed by them), would do wonders in terms of attracting new players and potential contributors. Some are bound to be coders... 0AD is still shockingly unknown, and in dire need of some good ol' marketing! It would just be nice to have something a little more coherent to market. Why not include a simple campaign for the first time. That would be revolutionary. Romans for example. Nothing too crazy. You play 5 maps, one after the other, each incrementally more difficult than the last. Then you integrate it with the tutorial (for the first map at least). Generate random maps with the right setting, and modify to liking with triggers and all. Is that beyond the realm of feasibility? How often are the Departments of Computer Science in universities contacted? Can't people write specific, pre-determined sections of code as a part of their bachelor's program or thesis or extra credit? It's an open-source project after all... It's historical so there's educational aspects... Advanced classes in digital art departments could probably model a new civ in less than two days (imagine 20 people working on a single civ as a class-project)...

@sphyrth You should not have any copyright and license issues for your video since almost all art assets in 0 A.D. are licensed under creative commons or similar free and open source licenses. However, @Hannibal_Barca please pay attention to the licenses and ask the authors of the assets in your mod to indicate the license. One more if you play it

Here are Darc's main theses as I understand them: 1. He's been here for years, and little to no improvement has been made 2. The updates we see are arbitrary at best (not really improvements) 3. Game Design first before producing features! All we have been getting are a bunch of features that don't really define how the game should be played; aimless updates. 4a. I tried modding with people (See Sybillae Vox), but the core game (which is broken) gets all the attention. 4b. Even if the Mod is successful, if all people see is the core game, won't like it and leave. 4c. That's what's happening with Delenda Est. 5. Etc

The Kingdom of Kush: Voyage a Meroë, au fleuve Blanc: au-delà de Fâzoql dans le midi du royaume de Sennâr, à Syouah et dans cinq autres oasis, fait dans les années 1819, 1820, 1821 et 1822 : accompagné de cartes géographiques, de planches représentant les monuments de ces contrées, avec des détails relatifs à l'état moderne et à l'histoire naturelle In this post, I will be sharing 60 plates from the book, "Voyage a Meroë", written and illustrated by Frédéric Cailliaud (a French naturalist, mineralogist and conchologist) and Jomard, Edme-François (a French cartographer, engineer, and archaeologist). As with the Lepsius Collection, I'm sharing all of the plates relevant to ancient Kush because of their rarity and historical value in general. What makes the plates so valuable is that they represent the earliest archaeological survey of Kushite remains in Sudan. Many of the sites have since been destroyed or degraded. These plates were produced between 1819 and 1822, just over a decade before the infamous Italian "explorer"/treasure-hunter, Giuseppe Ferlini destroyed over 40 Kushite pyramids in his search for gold... As such, these plates illustrate the most complete and in intact state of Meroitic pyramids in "modern" times, as well as many details on temples now lost. If you pay attention, you will see that the Lepsius expedition, some 20 years later, surveyed many of the same sites, and gives you an idea of the quality and accuracy of the works. About Frédéric Cailliaud: "He travelled in Egypt, Nubia, and Ethiopia, collecting minerals and making observations. He was a part of the military expedition that his patron Viceroy Muhammad Ali sent south to conquer the Kingdom of Sennar, but also marched further into Fazogli where Caillaud searched for outcroppings of gold while the commander Ismail, son of Muhammad Ali, enslaved locals and slaughtered all who resisted him. Although he failed to find any sizeable deposits of gold in the mountains along the modern Sudan-Ethiopia border, he did make a sufficiently detailed survey of the area to be published after he returned to France in 1827. "Shortly after his return, he published Travels in the Oasis of Thebes, with never-before-seen information on the people and places of the Western Desert. His Travels to Meroë (mer-oh-ay) not only offered similarly pioneering information on the peoples and regions south of the Nile’s first cataract, but also constituted the first scientific survey of Sudanese monuments. In addition, he brought back a large corpus of correctly copied textual material that, along with objects in his newly acquired collection, helped the historian Jean-François Champollion decipher the hieroglyphic language of ancient Egypt. So esteemed were Cailliaud’s contributions to knowledge that in 1824 he was awarded the French Legion of Honor."[1] He was curator of the museum at Nantes from 1836 to 1869" -Wikipedia- I will simply share the plates in their original order. Download the images to appreciate the details (they're very HQ). Naga = Naqa Ouad-Beyt-Naga = Wad Ben Naqa El-Mecaourah = Musawwarat es Sufra Assour = Begrawiya Royal Necropolis at Meroë Mont Barkal = Gebel Barkal (Napata) Nouri = Nuri Voyage a Meroë, the plates:

Like I stated - first comes the design decision. "Do we want directional combat? - Yes/no" "Do we want hardcounters? - Yes/no" "Do we want battalions? - Yes/no" Etc. etc. Edit: to clear my point more: First you have to know if you need something, and if you need it it's worth the effort to make it. Because once done it adds value to the game and brings it forward in development. This is something that seems to be forgotten here. And also this is the reason why I do not create another sub mod for 0 AD - much effort with no benefit because it's not taken over into the core game anyways. Just like DE or any other gameplay improving mod. After these decisions were done there need to be tickets/sub sections to think of ways how the details of such game parts are shown ingame. And then programmers should start working on the implementation or suggest/discuss about ways to implement it in a cool way. After that playtesting, thinking of ways to improve it and then tweak again until you get a nice result. Then you get a useful progress. The people who are part of the team will see that the tech demo becomes more and more of a game with each design step fulfilled and one day you get a proper release that you can call "playable beta" - which then is a real game, not a graphic demo anymore. If even the devs themselves do not want to play the game - why should someone else want to play it? And once again - I didn't say you have to take my concept and put it live. I just said that someone has to take charge on this matter and without it 0 ad will fail. As can be seen in every discussion that I read over here.

Practicing my 30 minute paints have a palace guard with a tiny labrys

About Oniversalis : Age of Exploration is a total conversion project for the game 0 A.D Empires Ascendant.This modification will bring the era of colonisation to the world, beginning with the late middle ages and ending with the 18th century.The player will be able to research different types of technology (such as gunpowder weaponry), recruit different and special units and build different buildings with different roles as different nation across the world, such as: Spain, England, France, Austria, Prussia, Portugal, Moghul Empire, Mayans, Aztecs, Muscovy and many other. Features A complete new era with a lot of changes from 0 A.D A total of 22 civilizations (not sure what the limit is, some no that important may be deleted) : Spain,Portugal,France,England,Austria,Brandenburg,Denmark,Sweden,Novgorod,Byzantium,Wallachia,Ottoman Empire,Serbia,Poland-Lithuania,Mamluks,Mughal Empire,Golden Horde,Yuan Dynasty,Aztec Empire,Maya,Inca,Pueblo,Iroqouis Confederacy,Japanese Empire Changing the gameplay from a fast-ending game in a long game that may take times to complete. New resources such as Spices and Gunpowder. A huge amount of buildings (you will need special units as you evolve to build new important buildings). A huge amount of technologies, as it was the era of the Renaissance and the Industrial Revolution. Lots of different military and civilian units. etc. Team -Vasikle - Developer and project leader (works on models, maps, textures,UI and almost evrything) {[ King of Romania ]} -Dan The Strategist - Mapper {[ Mayor of England ]} -Lion.Kazen - 2D Art and UI {[ Conquistador ]} -Stanislas69 - 3d Models and textures {[ Le Roi ]} +around 10-20 non-quality mappers and modellers. {[ Insolent Aztec Peasants ]} Thank you for viewing this mod ! Please remember to watch and support us.

This counts as hun or works as xiongnu?

I thought I wouldn't intervene as these kind of talks make me sad and wondering if I should continue to contribute to 0 A.D. or just do something else more personal with that time. That being said I just will answer Lordgood's posts. The question is not whether you would be neglecting the art department it's whether you would not be neglecting that position as well. As in will you have the time to regularly work on it. Art has this advantage that you don't need to feed it with new material constantly once you have reached a certain point. So yeah I'd say go ahead and take this hat if you think you can make a change. You would be seating on that empty chair. (Be warned it's on fire) I would still like to see more activity in that department but that's out of this thread. A council can work if there is someone that ends up taking decisions. It just feels a bit more democratic. But at some point someone will have to choose. Can't please everyone and if there's no majority then he has to decide what's best because that's why he was put in that position in the first place. I guess that 's somewhat what you meant by receptive. Stan out. *drops mic* EDIT : I just feel also some people are being left out (@fatherbushido I'm looking at you) and have tried to keep it working through all the haze that was thrown to them and made it a really frustrating experience.

I would be in favor of a single, receptive lead. Councils slow things down, in an already slow system, that's already full of councils. As long as everyone can voice their opinions, it won't be one sided, but quick and decisive.

I think instead of 1 person it should be a small group of dedicated people (6 max) That way it won't be one-sided Things can be proposed and voted over, that way we kind of manage to compress the different views of the masses

That error is what i would expect if reading a game saved before r20276

A room full of people debating with an empty chair. I'd love to take gameplay lead myself, with the team's blessing of course. I'd certainly be neglecting the art department more than I already am in that case lol

A lot of opinion and little decision. This is the real problem.

Imho we first should all agree on one document, stating, how the gameplay should do. Then we can decide for each patch if it implements that gameplay or not.

From a programming point of view, improving the engine is far more important than adding new content or trying to balance the game in an Alpha stage. The team is quite small and I certainly do not want them to waste their valuable time. However, it would be nice if there was a clear and simple mechanism for others to propose tiny changes without being a burden to the workload of the team. For instance, a dedicated subforum where minor proposals can be posted and voted upon; if a proposal has at least a dozen votes with, let's say, two-thirds in favour, it can be implemented; voting ends in a week or 36 hours after the last vote (whichever is greater). The above could work for tiny changes, e.g.: Reduce siege ram base attack by a factor x and add a x bonus attack vs structures Enable Briton dog kennels in Village phase Increase pikeman pierce damage from 3.0 to 5.0 NB: proposals should be clear, ready to land, and easy to review; e.g. “add a Thracian civilization” is unsuitable, but change the costs of technology y is perfectly fine (provided it contains the to be changed code).

Basically yes because units are easy to train and sometimes happens to fight never ending battles because units are easy to be replaced in late game in "mainland like" maps at advantage of civs which take thr most of the advantage from building barracks. Actually natural counters remove the need of introducing odd explicit counters, between units at least ( i'd like to see such bonuses while using formation rather than plan introduction) . Managing resources could be more crucial. Taining and building time(thing that perhaps in delenda est is too strong, at least for infinite time to build grainfields) reduction perhaps would promote different approaches to the mere e units spam wars.

We need our own programmers, probably these our weakness. My desire of making a funny RTS(no rats @#$%ing auto spell corrector) is more huge than my knowledge.

The game is spam an massive army and win.

I agree, the game is already too frenetic while managing army at moment and perhaps an overall build and training time reduction would be really nice.

Its very interesting make a good portrait of them with that helmet, like Liz Taylor Obviously with a Kushite face, a female Kushite.

Thanks for the improvements LordGood. The CC looks much better with the smaller trees and the vases! The model has become something I'd really want to show to others to show what nice progress has occured this release. I do agree that not all hellenic civic centers need that fountain, but I still wonder what purpose that wood serves? Wouldn't actual water look better?

I play singleplayer, because I consider multiplayer to be optional, which is why I rarely play multiplayer games and haven't taken to kindly to the shift in focus toward online multiplayer that has occurred in recent years. Perhaps an increase in training time is necessary in order to slow down the game a bit. But other than that, formations with bonuses to adequately portray ancient warfare, food trickle and other bonuses from the Corral, and proper naval combat are all that is needed at this point.

@LordGood @elexis @Imarok @gameboy. In the temple .dae file the prop point is misnamed (It's called : <node id="prop_garrisoned_001" name="prop_garrisoned_001" type="NODE"> Instead of <node id="prop_garrisoned" name="prop_garrisoned" type="NODE"> It can be edited directly in the dae file or by reexporting the file. Cheers.

Suprise stream! More twitch, more 0AD! Come check out the stream and enjoy some more multiplayer games. PS: I'm kinda ill so don't expect the 110% quality streamage you might have seen earlier. https://www.twitch.tv/chaffcommandercoffey

@elexis Shieldwolf23's and my own ideas are just that. Possible ideas/visions for the future of 0AD. Neither of us expect them to be implemented. That's not how it was supposed to come over at least. They were just examples. I won't argue the content of your reply, but I'm sure you knew shieldwolf knows that 0AD is open-source and he can create his own game if he likes. Neither of us are coding-wizards like you, and I'm sure you know that as well. This comment makes me sad, and is exactly the type of comment you don't want to see from your fans/player base. @WhiteTreePaladin About the lower quality maps thing, I also think it's an issue. They don't all need to be removed. The ones that can be updated should be updated using the best maps as a benchmark. I also think those totally unrealistic/unnatural looking maps should preferably be moved to a "fantasy map" section in my opinion.

@balduin: personally I don't like it that one dev develops/modifies the civ to his own taste (see the civ traits list he listed f.e.) (tbh I find it a bit weird too that he uses new civs to promote a gameplay mod (cause that is what Vox Populi)). So if you'd ask me, I would like to continue the development like we did before

Here's a sneak peek of the next faction getting ported over to 0AD: the Gorons. Stay tuned for their full roster of units. It seems I didn't take a peek in that file.

sheep cost-cost-time-profit meaning if we keep the ratio then using the sanga-cattle they should get the same amount of food in the same time for the same price (basically only model change)

@LordGood You and your work are truly inspiring!

easy, build the temples back to back to back and then upgrade them accordingly ta-da whole model

@Sundiata