Mythos_Ruler

Some cool stuff there Meph. I'll comment on some things. My comments will be in BOLD. Engine suggestions: Passible object areas (Usual objects are in their own square or rectangle and nothing can walk inside it. What if units could walk in some areas?) We have had some thoughts along these lines as well... namely units walking through town centers and such. We might not implement this in Part 1, but it is something on our radar. Passible data. (In a campaign, data such as quest vars can be sent from one scenario to another. For example, in a campaign, if you kill a character called "the general", a quest var is set to '1', but if you kill a character called "the dictator", the quest var is set to "2". In the next scenario of the campaign, it will be effected by the quest var. This is only an example of how this effect can be achieved.) This is most excellent. We too have had this idea. We haven't really started on the code for implementing campaigns yet, but this is something we've wanted, as gamers, forever. Editor suggestions: Password protection for scenarios. (One must type in a password to edit a map.) Then what happens if you forget the password? Should there be a whole identity check system so you can reset the password and all that? Also, how are we to prevent folks from just opening up the map script and finding the password? I think this would be very easy to crack. Hmm, unless the password feature was hosted locally and not with the map itself. A programmer would need to seriously think about how to implement this. Anti-rehosting for multiplayer playtesting. (When hosting a map to playtest, all players but the host have the map file deleted to prevent them from hosting it.) This could easily be done. Just include a gametype for the host... maybe a simple checkbox "delete remote map files" or something or a "testing mode" option for the host that does this. Equally sized. (You can change the size of an object by pressing "K", but you can't get objects the same size as eachother. There needs to be a way of doing this.) The plan so far is to be able to change scale of objects by inputting the scale manually. Like + or - X% in a form field. A good idea would be to allow the designer to select multiple objects and scale them all at once via this method. Scenario file XML editor. (The file can also be edited manually via its XML code aswell as using the editor tools.) I think any text editor would do the job. I like Notepad++ and use it for editing all the XML files I touch in the game, but there are other solutions out on the web as well. Visible LOS and Range. (A ring appears around a unit in the editor. It would show a units range. Another would how its LOS.) This could be toggled on and off in the editor with a simple button. Good thinking! Copy and paste triggers. (The ability to copy and paste triggers from one map to another.) Well, duh! Of course! Our triggers will be XML/script based, so they will be easy to move around as individual files. Copy and paste overlapping objects. (When this is attempted, one of the objects gets deleted to make room. This should not happen.) We don't have copy/paste functionality yet in our editor, so we'll see how this works out. Converting units. (If someone places a unit with the wrong player, he can change it without deleting it and placing it again.) Yeah, we can do this already. Just select the object and change the player number. Already implemented. Compatibility with mods. (For example, if someone makes a new unit, he or she can still use multiplayer etc.) This has been planned from the very beginning of this project. This is something we've always wanted to do. The way we want to implement mods is very very cool. Time will tell if we can make it as cool as we hope. lol Download custom music with scenarios. (When a map is being downloaded, the music for it is too.) Yeah, this goes with the one above. However, there should be a way to notify client players of the size and scope of the download before they even join the host's game. In this day and age a lot of people still have to watch their bandwidth usage. Make sure we are aware of what triggers do not work online. (Some triggers do not work online and cause Sync errors. We don't know which ones do that.) As we will support our editor after release, this should not be a problem. Ensemble Studios never ever supported their editors post-release. We will. We will fix all errors like this soon after they are discovered. Plus, with the moddability that is built into the game it will be very very easy for the community to fix these things too. We won't use the community as a crutch, but I think the ingenuity of the community will be such that "fan patches" will be ubiquitous. Object flipping tool. (A tool that lets one flip any object. This is not a rotate tool.) We'll have an object movement tool in the editor that will do just about anything you can think off, I'd imagine. Custom special attacks. (A tool that lets one make his or her own special attacks for units.) I don't think we'll have a special tool for this. However, it'll be very easy to edit units and to create your own that will have whatever kind of attack you want. Support for "if{} else{}" in triggers. Probably. Copy and pasted flipped units. (When copying and pasting a unit, it will also copy its size that it might have been enlarged at and digrees that it's flipped.) Good one. Copying a unit or object should also copy its current state. Enlarging units (By pressing a button or pressing a key on the keyboard, all units selected can be enlarged or shrank.) I think it would be much more precise to use % numbers in a form field. However, perhaps hotkeys can be used and they scale in 1% increments - the scale showing up dynamically in the form field. Multiple players (In multiplayer scenarios, you can only have a pre-set amount of players that can never be changed. However, what if you could have a scenario where you can choose two number of players. For example, a map might be able to support either having 4 players or 6 players.) Please explain further. I am confused. I think you could already do that with triggers. If 4 players, then kill players 5 and 6. Something like that. Controling resigned players. (If a player resigns in a multiplayer map, an allied player could be able to control his or her units. This could be switched on or off with a trigger effect.) This could also be a Hosting option. Not sure if we'll implement that though. We have a laundry list of cool features we want already. We've also thought about "tributing" units between allies and other such cool things. But I think initially, as far as gameplay goes, we'll focus on releasing a fundamentally stable, balanced, and traditional RTS game with a few enhancements and innovations along the way. A lot of "backburner" items can come later in subsequent patches. AI is set by a scenario. (In multiplayer, A map maker has the option of having the AI pre-set father than leting the host of the map chose what and how many AIs there will be.) Reasonable. Setting the Z axis of some objects. (Objects can be placed anywhere on the map but up. Not all objects should be allowed to levitate however. For example, units (i.e. infantry, villagers, etc). Units should also be able to walk under the raised objects if they're high enough.) Cool ideas. Maybe 0 A.D. 2.5 Stretch objects. (A feature where if an object is clicked on, there is a tool that can stretch it.) Not gonna happen. Complete support for modifications. Yeah, planned from the beginning. It maybe won't be the UBER zOMG moddable game everyone has in their heads, but it will be amazing what you will be able to do when compared to a AAA game like AOK or AOM. Search box. (When a drop down list with a lot of items such as fire event appears, there should be a search box to narrow down the results to find the item being searched for easier.) Random Map Editor. (A tool that allows someone with little or no experience of code to create a random map.) Everyone's always wanted this. Perhaps for 0 A.D. Part 2 we'll integrate something like that into our Atlas Editor. Trigger suggestions: Modify Selected Unit. (An effect similar to modify protounit, but will edit the stats of a selected unit rather than the protunit. For example: I could selected an archer belonging to player 4 and increased it's hitpoints. In Age of Mythology and Age of Empires III, you can't do that. You have to select the archer from a list and all of the units for that player will be edited (i.e. modify protounit). Modify protounit should still be kept.) Yeah, we have plans to allow editing of individual units, as well as the entire protounit. Quest Var versions of effects. (Versions of triggers that use quest vars. For example, a "fake counter" effect might say "You have killed X units", with X being the number of units killed.) Player Change Major. God (An effect that changes a players God.) Not applicable to 0 A.D., per se. Prolly an effect that changes a player's civilization or faction. Player Change Color. (An effect that changes a player's colour.) Sure. Teleport Unit supports online (The "teleport unit" effect doesn't work online. Please change it so that it does.) Player Kill One God Power. (e.g. Kill the rain god power but don't destroy any others.)

Zeno Clash wasn't my favorite to win. Infinity just looks amazing and has features I've always wanted in a space game. I voted for that one. I think 0 A.D. will look much better next year after 8 or so months of Open Source help and 8 more months of art work and promotional material (videos, screenshots, and music).

Get you to work on our Roman buildings.

Hey Phil. What's crackalackin?

Well, we are in a catch-22. We need exposure to gain good team members.

Any chance we could get you to join? :)

Excellent excellent stuff Decimus! I think I might have seen some of your work on conceptart.org? Or maybe in a Google image search. Not sure, but it is all AAA work. I love it.

My ex-wife's grandmother looked like this when she died of Pancreatic cancer. The day we find the cure for cancer will be a good day indeed. It's coming though - there are many very very promising therapies in the pipeline that should become available for wide use within about 5 years or so. There might come a day where cancer can be endured like HIV can be endured (with heavy therapies). Hopefully the curing therapies for cancer won't be as expensive as those for AIDS.

Yap, kinda my point.

Well, if that were the case then we'd have to "worry" about every software release and view them all as competitors! zomg!!1!!

SC2 is not a danger to us. It is a SCi Fi game, ours is historical.

The mod changes gameplay as well.

You can "replenish" troops instantly by combining depleted units of the same type. Just drag one card and drop it over another (you can do this with retinues as well!). The game is much much deeper than a lot of people think. Your family members' traits and retinues do really affect gameplay a lot, especially with city management. Build up super assassins by assassinating petty captains and hapless enemy diplomats before attempting to kill higher ranking enemy family members. The experience system is very good. You can move troops around the map faster by upgrading your roads. It's one of the first things I build when I capture a city. You can also move small armies of cavalry farther per turn than mixed armies (cavalry and infantry), so a divide and march approach could work well if you are trying to get more troops from the center of your empire to the front lines.

Actually the RTW mods Roma Surrectum and Rome:Total Realism could be good sources for inspiration. As a side note: I play Rome:Total Realism Platinum Edition and it is fantastic. My Macedonian Empire now stretches from Illyria to Dacia, Thrace, the borders of Sarmasia, most of Asia Minor, all of Greece, Crete, Rhodes, and Cyprus. The Romans are starting to send their hordes into Illyria and are giving me all kinds of trouble. I recently spanked the Thracians to within an inch of their lives, so my northern borders are good. I have conquered Cilicia and am using the city Tarsus and the Cilician gates near Antioch as my "Thermopylae" of sorts to keep the Seleucids out of Asia Minor while I struggle against Pontus, who have given me a lot of trouble. To help alleviate the Roman attacks on my holdings in Illyria I sent 2 full armies on a suicide mission into Italia (which by now has been under total Roman domination for about a century of game time). I captured Rome, enslaved the people (around 25,000! ), then raised all the buildings. I did this with as many Italian cities as possible until the Roman hordes returned from Illyria and crushed my expeditionary armies in their homeland. What this did was severely weakened the Romans in their heartland and gave me time to rebuild my forces in Illyria in time to face the returning Roman armies. I am finally starting to beat them back. Just as I start to beat back the Romans, Pontus starts sieging my cities in Asia Minor (bah!!!). Great game! Great mod! The original vanilla version of RTW was disappointing, but the "Total Realism" mod is quite exciting and involving.

Perhaps Goths, Vandals, and Franks for Germanic sub-factions (Franks so we could use their cool throwing axemen). The problem would be finding unique heroes and super units for each. 2-3 heroes for each as well as 2 super units for each. Super units are our game's "unique units" unique to that faction or sub-faction only.

Not sure how fancy we'd get with tech trees and building trees. We might have the manpower by the time we start developing Part 2 or we might not. I suspect it will all depend on the success of (or lack thereof) the 0 A.D. Part 1 release. One of my ideas for Part 2 would be to give each faction a "special ability" similar to a god power from AOM, but they cost resources and have a recharge time. So, like the Eastern Romans (Early Byzantines) would have a Hippodrome building for chariot races. There would be a "chariot race" button in the GUI (called "Bread and Circuses!) when you select the Hippodrome. Click the button, a boatload of resources is taken from your stockpile (Food and Metal, ie "Gold" I'd imagine), the crowd ROARS (all players hear it), and all your cavalry get double charge bonuses for 90 seconds. The ability would take about 5 mins to recharge. Things like that.

Greeks, Egyptians, Norse, Mayans, and Hindus. That's what I'd envision. Although I'd prolly combine the Mayans and Aztecs into an all-encompassing "Meso-American" faction.

Well, play style can be influenced via economics, technology trees, civ bonuses, team bonuses, and building trees as well. It's not all about the military aspect, if you know what I mean. So, for instance, even though both the Parthians and Huns will be heavily cavalry oriented, they will both play completely different styles because of their tech trees, their building trees, economic styles, etc. Likewise, the early Roman Empire was much different than the late Roman Empire (260AD+) both militarily and economically (and socially and technologically, as you could imagine).

Agreed. 12 should be good. Anything additional will be... additional.

Because additional content is just that: additional.

Because the game does 6 factions per part. Part 1 = 6 factions. Part 2 = 6 factions. That has always been the plan. We ain't gonna change it.

I could see Sassanids, Sarmatians, and Palmyrans as uber patch factions. I mean by 0 A.D. 2.5 or whatever we should pros at doing this stuff, right? Scythians would be a sweet civ too, but they'd just be a clone or love child between Huns and Sarmatians.

My favored factions for Part 2 would be: - Imperial Rome (the stereotypical "Roman Empire" we've all grown to love) - Eastern Rome/Late Empire/Early Byzantine (whatever you want to call it, I don't care. We'll probably call it Byzantine Empire to help distinguish it) - Dacians - Germans (Visigoths, Ostrogoths, etc.) - Huns - Parthians

We are gonna space out the screenshots and other media releases so we can release multiple things at once in a media blitz. Probably every 2 or 3 months. The benefit of this is your appetite grows larger for more material and I can justify releasing a bunch of different stuff at once. So, for instance instead of 3 regular screenshots over a period of 2 or 3 months, every 2 or 3 months I can release a packet of media, like 2 or 3 screenshots telling a story, a small video, a piece of music, and a showcase on ModDB - all at once (I'm not saying every release will be so large, but it's a possibility). The other benefit is you are guaranteed to see something new if we space out the media releases more.

An "Age of Mythology 2" full conversion is something I have in mind.