Drin

Hey all, Yesterday I successfully played my first multiplayer game through the lobby, which was fantastic. Had a great time, so big thanks to everyone that helped get it running! I did, however, run into one problem. I tried setting up multiplayer games with my brother multiple times on this alpha and the last one with no success, until yesterday when a very helpful person in the lobby told me how to set up port forwarding. As a non-coder, a casual gamer, and not that tech-savvy of a person I've never had to use or even heard of port-forwarding before. I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one to experience this problem, especially as the audience for 0 AD grows. A lot of us casual gamers enjoy playing but really have no idea how to troubleshoot. The article on how to set up a multiplayer game was helpful, but I do have two more suggestions. 1. Is there a way to make the "disconnect-- unknown error" messages a little more clear? Or to give a list of possible common problems so somebody like me can have some idea where to start? 2. Perhaps the WFGbot in the lobby could have a default chat saying something like "make sure your port forwarding and firewall are set up to play 0 AD, more information available here" and link to the article on multiplayer games? Once again, thanks so much! I just want to make sure that the multiplayer community has a chance to really thrive and that new players aren't turned off instantly by being unable to connect.

Pathing is a huge issue in most, if not all, RTS games. As a non-coder I don't have any real solutions on the back end, but conceptually I wonder if something like this would work: units far in the back run to catch up, units in front keep moving at regular pace until they reach their destination, then pause and wait for back units to arrive. Prevents running backwards and clogging on choke points. Alternately, perhaps units outside of a certain distance from the formation would automatically be excluded from the formation until they get closer and the formation can move without them.

Fantastic. Looks fabulous! Love this game, and love where it's going!

Walls in early stages of the game are particularly strong, especially for starting Iberians, IMO that is partly because of embedded automatic wall towers. Perhaps the attack on these should be an upgrade and not something they start with?

Hey everyone, I've been following and playing 0AD for about six months after discovering it on wikipedia, of all places. I'm a long time RTS fan. Started with the entire Age of Empires franchise, and eventually wound up mostly playing Starcraft 2 these days. 0AD appeals to me for the indie development, of course, but also the classic "sword and shield" setting. Excited to see where it's going! For many years I've had a hobby of designing board games. I've learned a lot of principles about what makes a game successful, especially in drawing in new players. If any of that experience would be helpful I'm more than willing to contribute. I'm particularly excited to see a multiplayer lobby. I've been a bit of a competitive RTS player when I have the time for it, and an avid fan of good shoutcasting for RTS games. I may be willing to help with moderating a ladder/ranking system, managing tournaments, or dabbling in shoutcasting if any of those would be helpful to growing the game and adding interest. I believe good competitive multiplayer communities are a fantastic way to grow a game and it's community. I have a bachelors degree in music management, which essentially is a business degree for the music industry. I may be able to help brainstorm or execute marketing strategies if that would be helpful. I'm also a musician and producer, but I think your crew is doing an excellent job in that area already, so hats off to them! At any rate, you all are fantastic! Thank you so much to everyone who is coding, drawing, and doing all those crazy talented things I have no aptitude for whatsoever. You're awesome! May the sun shine on your sword ever brightly, Drin