Thorfinn the Shallow Minded

The ability to lame resources could definitely be problematic, but provided that there are significant nerfs to palisade stats outside friendly territory, that could be regarded as a non-issue. Is there something I might otherwise be missing?

Thanks.

Not to sound skeptical, but just at a glance it seems a bit odd to me that there would be that noticeable of a difference in average pike lengths between two successor states. Would you mind providing any source that backs that up?

Mainly what I am getting at is unnecessary differentiation. Trying to shoehorn stuff, like sword versus spear, in a way that doesn't even work from a gameplay perspective let alone a historical one is meaningless. I agree that there should be different types of spear cavalry, but effort shouldn't be on trying to wedge them into a particular tactical niche beyond what makes sense. I don't wish to imply that you are trying to say that; in fact I would say that your patch work have helped the game immensely.

Is there a more relevant area for this post?

Just to let my opinion on the battalion idea be heard since I might have come off as a skeptic to it, I think that it is a great way of streamlining an otherwise micro-intensive genre and would fully support its use in the main game. Despite that fact, I think that having some of the aspects such as flanking could and should be represented even without that kind of feature. Since its beginning 0 A.D. has embraced the idea of proper tactics being in place instead of a mosh pit style of fighting represented in many RTS games, and I want to push towards that goal as best as possible... by just posting my opinions in the forums.

I wonder why you would be led to think that...

@ChronA: I think a god deal of what you have is well thought out. But... The hugest issue I see is that you are putting out a system that seems a bit needlessly complex. In fairness, the same can be said for 0 A.D. and many RTS games. As I see it, there doesn't need to be an emphasis on differentiating armament for the most part. This is a general idea of Thorfinn's Shallow Minded approach to the concept: Heavy infantry: Strengths: heavy armour, frontal attacks. Weaknesses: Small Stamina, bad line of sight, vulnerable to flanking manoeuvres, and kiting. Use: the meat-grinder at the front that is capable of small distance charging to catch out ranged units that are too close. Skirmisher: Strengths: Armour piercing attack, high damage, good line-of-sight. Weaknesses: Low armour, short range. Use: screening force that can lay out ambushes on careless players. Its armour lets it hold up a bit against ranged attacks. Can be a decent counter to Heavy infantry with good micro. The list goes on. Many more special outliers can just be worked out just by modifying these. Let's take an example: Skiritae. Skiritae were essentially heavy infantry given the fact that they were fielded in the Spartan phalanx formation at the Battle of Mantinea in the Peloponnesian War, but their function along with what Xenophon writes about in Cyropaedia implies that they were somewhat like special ops troops (the analogy is a stretch but bear with me.). Thus, as heavy infantry, they would have a lower amount of armour but would on the flip-side enjoy higher stamina that would allow them to serve a more flexible purpose. So anyways, a lot of what badosu wrote above were some of my thoughts but written in a more succinct fashion.

At the moment, units are arbitrarily divided into sword and spear melee categories. I would argue that this distinction is bad for the following reasons: Few soldiers equipped exclusively swords, which were primarily a side arm. The representation of sword units being a counter to spear units is ludicrous for our purposes during the ancient times. Instead, disciplined all infantry formations should always be able to withstand frontal cavalry assaults. Any differentiation between spear and sword wielding is similarly arbitrary. The spearman, a unit type that is countered by sword and ranged units, is largely ineffective against cavalry due to a lack of adequate mobility. Thus, there should instead just be melee infantry and melee cavalry, with subtypes based more around armour and training yet still retaining the core functions of their parent categories. This would greatly streamline one of the game's more unintuitive aspects. I've intentionally kept this brief and would be willing to elaborate my points if needed.

While I have played a bit of multiplayer, I never tried competing on a high level and almost definitely made subpar choices when it came to strategy, and I was hoping that some of the higher level players would share their playstyles, whether it be about a single faction or just general rule of thumb. Thanks.

In a game where women take eight seconds to be born, I think that a few mechanical changes would make nomads feel organic enough, accurate or not.

I checked out some footage; definitely it's more on the visible side of things. Could you give a numerical comparison of what percentage of a difference in speed Delenda Est has?

The other approach would be altering the arrow's initial velocity. At maximum range, when not accounting for differences in elevation with the target, archers should always use a 45 degree angle. This angle can change as the target gets closer.

I'd just like to make a humble suggestion that arrows and javelins should arc more when launched. I won't make any claim regarding the angle archers historically used, but in general, I prefer that aesthetic since the projectiles are easier to see, and they do not clip through as many buildings and units, breaking the visual immersion.

For all technical purposes, the Athenian faction does represent itself both during the Persian and Peloponnesian Wars given the fact that Pericles is represented as a hero.

For some of the navy based heroes, maybe being able to train a flagship specifically for them would be a fun option.

I wonder if Porus would be an appropriate addition despite his being a king before the formation of the Maurya Empire. He would make a fun historic rival to Alexander.

The solution here seems obvious: spearmen/pikemen should be able to disable rams about as well as swordsmen.

I think that you might be mistaking Agis III with Agis IV, who was famous for attempting a series of reforms; likewise, as such, wouldn't he be better served being equipped with equipment to match the pikemen in that case?

A few thoughts regarding your concepts: Ionian revolt is an annoyingly situational. I would rather recommend something based around his colonial efforts in Thrace, making Civic Centres cheaper. For Iphicrates, I would propose giving ranged infantry (particularly peltasts) better melee armour instead of movement speed; it's hard to exactly say what his reforms specifically did, but improving their performance in melee fights is a generally accepted theory. I'd propose that Themistocles' Naval Architect technology be renamed 'Wooden Walls' in reference to the oracle. Other than that, it would be nice if Themistocles had some bonus to wall-building. He was instrumental in delaying the Spartans so that Athens could rebuild its walls and even was a leading mind behind the famous Long Walls.

Xenophon was hardly patriotic and seems like a poor choice due to that. For Carthage, I think that a naval hero such as Hanno the Navigator would be a brilliant option. Regarding Socrates, while I don't want to undermine his importance as an intellectual figure (or military one), it would seem better to feature others such as Cimon or his father Miltiades. Athens could easily represent the philosophic schools with an academy structure.

Well Total War has never really advertised itself as a historically accurate series. Take Rome Total War's disgraceful approach to Spartans, head throwers, berserkers, and Roman ninjas. This take has some glaring issues with the skull headresses, but the armour and such look no worse to me than most any other Total War Game. If the game was an effort to be historically accurate, I'd say that the experience might be a bit disappointing.

Aside from an approach that seems a bit backwards to me, there are some strange generalisations made about each civilisation. The Persians were a force to be reckoned with, but they were easily defeated by a collection of city-states and had to heavily rely on Greek mercenaries to have a decent force of infantry. The Macedonians were well and good, but the other successor states are just as much based on similar tactics as them. You can say that the Seleucids kept on getting beaten up, but there were many enemies around them and general instability; what makes a successor state 'failed' is another rather odd thing to me. Rome's having a good navy is also odd. Granted, if their use of the corvus could be represented in naval warfare, it would have an interesting impact on a meta that in the future meta that would probably focus around ramming. Instead of groupings like this, I would advise considering historical rivalries as a basis as opposed to formal tier lists, keeping in mind that just because two civilisations are equally effective against the same civilisation, it does not mean that they would match up well against each other. For instance, Athens had rivals in the game of Persia and Sparta, so making these fairly balanced becomes just a matter of looking at those to combinations in isolation. Granted, Sparta campaigned extensively against Persia also, making it a prime candidate as a rival of sorts also. The list goes on, examining individual factions and finding about two or three different rivalries to work with. The whole thing would be pretty convoluted, but so is balance.

Agreed. People should keep their mouses out of frame when posting screenshots. In seriousness, that is a bit much. To paraphrase John Cleese: "What did the Romans do to them?"

That first sentence is a bold claim. Simply because there is no physical law does not mean that there are no moral absolutes; even a good number of atheists such as Sam Harris subscribe to the point that a distinction between values and scientific facts is arbitrary and instead use naturalistic principles to derive their moral systems. Just because points of view differ from one time to the next does not undermine that given the fact that humans are flawed.