Sighvatr

Technology Technology should be risky. Currently 0 A.D. alike to Age of Empires, do not emphasize on the technology factor of the game, rather it feels like something that contributes to a racing game feel. I suggest creating a bigger impact on the game play by increasing the price of resources to buy technology. The current 0 A.D. game allows the player to create a certain mental pattern of what technology to buy next to race to the later game phase. Technology in the game feels like an unconscious role that does not impact the player's decisions. If the game increases the price of technology to an expensive amount, the player has to think about what technology would impact them in the entire game. Technology should be a risk factor that players have to consider ahead of in game. For example, would buying a wood gathering technology be more efficient than a metal gathering technology depending if my opponent is going to field either professional spear or cavalry units later in the game? Should I spend my resources purchasing the majority of the equipment for my troops or should I focus on bettering one kind of unit? Technology should be expensive so that players buy depending on the situation. It slows down the players to consider the game to a situational strategic thinking play style rather than a race against time to buy everything essential to play against your opponent. If technology is expensive, the one pattern technology mentality would be ineffective and allow the players whom consider how their opponent plays to be able to purchase technology needed to counter. Buildings Technology existence should rely on the buildings they were purchased from. If I destroy my opponent's armoury, he should not be able to purchase units with benefits of the technology purchased from the armoury. I dislike how useless buildings become after purchasing all of the technology that come from them. It doesn't make sense if military units get effective equipment if they do not have an armoury to get that equipment from. It would be another interesting game play feature if you can handicap your opponent by destroying the buildings essential to providing technology. If I could downgrade my opponents newly created spearmen by destroying the fortress that gives the civilian soldier bonus, I could then use my heavily upgraded cavalry to kill off my opponent. By the threat of losing technology if the specific technology building is destroyed, players would have to develop a more defensive play style to prevent such a situation. Formations Formations aren't incredibly developed in 0 A.D. currently, but they should be something to consider as a tactical approach to prevent and create counters. Currently 0 A.D. focuses on counters for units individually rather than for a whole formation, and formations seem to only affect the units with small stat changes. Formations and how they are used should be what is a deciding factor to hard counters. For example, if I field an army of archers against my opponent's hastati, my opponent would then enable the testudo which would then benefit his hastati to become immune to slingers and archers. Then if I use my cavalry to use a flying wedge formation, they would charge into the hastati testudo and break them out of formation to become exposed to projectile fire. With hard countering formations, a unit total minimum should be required to create that formation; therefore, the player may have to consider creating a large amount of units to get the benefits of the formation. Formations would make battles and sieges require more control from a player rather than a mass of fodder units enveloping themselves into a chaos that tends to favor ranged units (why ranged and mobile units are more favored than infantry units in Age of Empires 1&2). Formations and hard benefits to using them would hopefully help the players who prefer using large massed armies over the players that win by controlling widespread groups of few units each and use guerilla warfare to win the game.

Lion, please don't quote that guy's helmet models. I've had historical debates with him in the past for how the equipment should look like. That guy creates models based off of the first page of google search images. Though I have to say that my understanding of how the classical era should look like completely contrast what 0 A.D. is.

I also had in mind of creating a basic version of that helmet. If you take out the decorative details of the helmet, the crest and feathers: you get a very practical shaped helmet that is almost a cross between the medieval sallet helmet and the roman montefortino. Otherwise what you are attempting to imitate is that of a roman era artist's drawing of a macedonian officer's helmet in macedonia. Realistically, no army is going to have the time to produce all the luxuriously detailed helmets if they are to provide for an army. Two, soldiers may not want to spend the extra money for a detailed helmet in order to have what is required in the army assuming that the successor states proceeded to follow Alexander's requirements to be in the phalanx.

I also suggested in the past to create a turtle formation for all shield infantry units where they become immune to projectiles, but remain still and can only be exposed through melee attack. This way speedy archers arent the best next reliable tool for killing off units.

I am from the United States and I am currently living in Florida (the little peninsula that sticks out next to Mexico). Originally I stick with a nick name by Slytacular, but my love for Viking history and the game community I used to play had me seek out a nordic name. I spot Sighvatr on the list and stuck with it. If I remember, Sighvatr was the name to an Icelandic poet.

I can't stop laughing! I would play this because LordGood made it. I am also very curious about how you would animate four-legged creatures to do humanoid tasks.

I think the purpose of the buff for the Ptolemaic phalangiates is to make up for the lack of good starting town center citizen units. I think most factions have starting units that counter the ptolemaic units which makes rushing the Ptolemy player ideal. Else I would suggest the development team to rethink the unit roster for the Ptolemaics since the units don't seem to balance correctly. Probably switch the phalangiates to the barracks. Thorax shield spearman and some kind of peltast to the town center. Move the archer to the mercenary settlement building. Include mercenary hoplites to the mercenary settlement building.

Basically this thread is a poll for limited resources versus infinite? If farms were to be limited, gameplay would be more decisive if a player controls all of the key resources like metal and stone.

Can somebody update the list?

Looking good!

Funding?

I like that!

Snowflake rocks map would be difficult to play on with the additional changes of the farms mentioned. I do like the ideas thrown around here. I like the idea to distance farms away from buildings, and I like the idea to reduce the amount of workers per farm. Aesthetically, it would make the farms look more family operated rather than communal.

I actually think it looks nice with the buildings because markets are usually crowded in between structures. If you go to a market in a suburbs or rural area, you see farmer and flea markets in an open tent. If you go to markets in Tel-Aviv, Jerusalem, or even places like La Paz in Bolivia, you see lots of markets crowded on streets. Smelly Medieval London had market stalls paralleling the streets. Since this game involves building an economy through phases of size, I think the city look of a market looks more appropriate.

Mythos, if you are concerned about gameplay balance, then make the ptolemies balanced but leaning towards building an economy. I already explained to you about the mercenary camps. The mercenaries were brought in to Egypt and made as citizens. Note the 20-50 times the author in the above article mentioned about Kleruchs. It makes more sense for the Ptolemaics to have the military settlements because there were military settlements? Do you need me to provide examples from hard copy articles that I read? Like Romulus, I am a willing and caring fan of 0 A.D. and I am willing to get in a fist fight about the Ptolemies!

Yeah, but can you not think of something else to make them unique based off what they had rather than giving them false things? The Ptolemaics lasted for 300 years. They were known for having a powerful economy and were the wealthiest nation for a long period of time. Seleucids should be more of the military focused nation. Make the Ptolemaics more of an economy focused nation.

The one in Israel? I visited the ruins there.

I think I have read the same book as you have, mega! I do wish the ptolemaics in 0 A.D. focus more on the kleruch and machimoi. Also, why mercenary camps for ptolemies when the articles say that the ptolemaic empire made citizens out of the mercenaries? Mercenary camp should be more of a carthaginian thing rather than ptolemaic.

So give Athens and Sparta phalangiates?

I am playing with an idea in my head about what if we increase the resources required to purchase technologies at an expensive price? For example: In order to purchase the woodchopping technology, the player must have 1000 metal. If the technologies are bumped up to an expensive price, players are limited to what they can purchase. If the players are limited to what they can purchase, gameplay becomes more diverse in play-style. Of course players that harvest more resources have more freedom to purchase improved technology that would make the difference in this game. My point is that I think technology is too easy to buy, and it is more of a "timing" thing rather than something a player has to understand how their gameplay will be greatly affected by the purchase of the technology. I mean "timing" as in the order of actions a player takes to get ahead in the race of building your city and army. Woodcutting is hardly thought about when purchased because every player is going to have either that tech or the wheelbarrow. If technology is more expensive to purchase in the game, the more likely players will not have the same order of technology purchased making the game more interesting and diverse in playstyle.

I am getting the feeling that this needs testing to get it right?

Can somebody provide me a bronze texture I can use? I dont want to retexture the helmets.

If you make an image slightly transparent, will a faction color show? I have an idea for the tower, and that is to make it white with a 50% opacity. It will make the tower look showy, interesting, and easy to spot.

Yeah, I freaked out a little bit. Sorry about that. Kind of wish I can take that post back.

Looks a bit short on the head. Try scaling it to give it more height.