wowgetoffyourcellphone

Kind of an odd announcement. Nothing to show. Best wishes though.

:P

Right, I imagine the Scythians could look a lot like this: But with more Scythian decor/aesthetic: https://www.google.com/search?q=scythian+textiles

I agree. I don't understand why everyone wants everything oversaturated and cartoony. Player color, I understand, but the base diffuse colors should be rather realistic.

I confirm that my local SVN version of the mod does indeed enter the lobby correctly.

I like your analysis, but this paragraph is key: This is the "real world" difference that's not accounted for in your analysis (to give you credit, you admit this). The different movement speeds for shuttling compound the economic impact shown in your data. Now, previously, some folks said, "Let's just give every soldier the same walking speed. That should solve it!" which I think is not a comprehensive solution, and the "combat balance" of the game, so much as it is, takes into account these walking speeds, so if you did that then the balance would be off again. No, I think the best, comprehensive solution is to have a ShuttleSpeed element for the unit templates. We can set all gatherers to the same ShuttleSpeed, something like 6.5 for the base game. Doing this then removes this problem. That's because Skiritai are basically Elite Citizen-Soldiers from the get go. They also have a high Walk Speed. Yeah, we shouldn't want that. So, let's all get on board with ShuttleSpeed! One of the byproducts of throwing out hard counters is now you have 3 ranged infantry units with no clearly defined roles (their stats are just slightly different and players just figure out which one has the best stats and spams those), so that now you have side issues like this economic question. Let's have ShuttleSpeed so the economic consideration is removed and players can choose units based on their combat prowess and strategy, and not be disincentivized by shuttling speed.

I'd differentiate the background color from the main color pallette of the subject.

This will be fixed when WFG debuts the Alpha 23 fix release.

Very nice. You need AO maps for max awesomeness tho. @stanislas69

Different units have different gather rates? About shuttle speed in the template, I would set it to the same for all units. The point would be that it is controllable in the template so that you can have a uniform shuttling speed for citizen-soldiers (probably the speed of your slowest walking infantryman) while maintaining that they can have differing regular "walk" speeds (fast moving slingers, slow pikemen, etc.). Since it's controlled in the templates, you could have techs or bonuses which modify this shuttling speed, but don't affect normal walking rates.

Basically the mod needs a polish.

I've wanted a shuttle speed element for templates for a long time, but it was dismissed as unnecessary.

Another idea would be to treat weapons and armor and other things like ungatherable resources. Using the barter mechanic already in the game, you can convert wood and metal at the Blacksmith to spears, swords, chain mail, etc. "resources" which are then added to the player's stockpile. Hoplites then don't cost "50 food and 50 wood", they cost X amount of spear resource and Y amount of shield resource, etc. and -Z food per minute. At the corral, I could see converting the Food resource into the Horse resource, so that cavalry also cost an amount of Horse resource.

While I don't think the main game should do this, i think it would be great to have the ability in the engine for mods to do this. The major thing, IMHO, is the UI for it, specifically for things like the negative food trickle for each unit. What you need to show in the UI is some kind of drainage rate from the food stockpile, like what the Rise of Nations UI shows, but currently the UI can't do that. I've experimented with a Food drainage for units and the UI thing is essential, IMHO. You could do something similar with Mercenary units, which would slowly drain your Metal or Coin resource.

Perhaps catapults could lose a little bit of health for every shot.

Oh.

I wonder if the ships in game shouldn't just be smaller.

That's... not what a beta is for...

Perfect opportunity for the meteor god power. lol

Another idea is that you can train light, medium, and heavy versions of most types of units (affecting speed, armor, attack, cost, etc.), depending on your tactical needs and overall strategy (and the amount of coin in your purse; if you're low on funds you can still train light troops to hold the enemy at bay until your treasury can be refilled). Only light is available at first and you have to unlock medium and heavy options at the Blacksmith by teching different armor and weaponry options. Would take a little GUI work, but not bad; imagine clicking the swordsman icon at the barracks and you see the 3 swordsman options quickly slide up. And while I think this should be moved to the Gameplay Discussion forum, I don't think Empires Ascendant is going to change much in this regard, so whatever you want to do will probably have to be part of a mod. Unless your goal is to join the team and implement some of this stuff into EA.

Hmm, perhaps some better explanation. What does "actual" mean in this context? Some examples would be nice too. I imagine you mean by "actual" is just the current Empires Ascendant way. "unlocking next tear of the same unit and improving it by that" would be the Age of Empires way. "having basic unit and choosing its path (light vs heavy)" would be like starting with a generic soldier dude and then customizing it. So, you'd start with a generic melee dude with a knife, then you can choose a path from spearman to hoplite to pikeman, or from knife dude to light swordsman to heavy swordsman. A branching way. Or a generic militia knife guy, you can branch from melee options or ranged options. This is kind of cool, but feels kind of generic to me. Perhaps have a meta "soldier customization" feature/UI that's done before matches, not in real-time. This would go well with battalions, because you could customize your battalions with different kinds of historically accurate kit, and their costs and stats change accordingly. "unlocking light / heavy unit but could train all of the types after unlocked" so basically is a tech barrier to melee and ranged branches. Kind of the least inspiring options. I think by building an archery range that kind of implies you should get access to some kind of light ranged units without having to tech them.

Didn't you originally support the idea?

I remember 10 years ago we thought games would look photorealistic by now... lol...

So, the current "falcon" model in the game being about the size of a Pteranodon, anyone willing to make a new falcon for DE/core game? That way I can make a falcon scout unit for the Xiongnu. The current "falcon" in the game can be renamed to Golden Eagle. Some attack animations would be cool too, see Hyrule Conquest for a neat flying unit that attacks.

It would just help distinguish your mod from the mass of mods currently available.