Sundiata

I think in the real world the primary weapon of melee cavalry has always been spears/lances. Swords were a secondary weapon: when the spear broke, or was dropped/lost, close quarter mosh pit style combat, or when the unit was dismounted making the long spear unwieldy for 1v1 combat. I think dedicated "sword cav" is mostly a game convention. In antiquity cavalry was primarily used against other cavalry, scouting, and chasing down retreating/fleeing units. They're particularly useful for their speed and manoeuvrability, exploiting weak point in the enemy lines. They perform very well against lightly armed units. They perform very poorly against disciplined heavy infantry. If the cav is armored, they can perform well against ranged units. If not, they're very vulnerable to missiles.

It's nice to be part of a community that understands the struggle... I woke up this morning with no power like:

@ValihrAnt, @borg-, @Boudica, Am I seeing a game balance department in the making? If you're able to reach consensus on things amongst yourselves, then convincing the community probably won't be that hard. We need some experienced people to take initiative on this, because there currently isn't a balance department in the dev team. If you work as a team on this, you'd effectively become that department, and I think the devs might/should be amenable to this. Even if they're not, we'll just start a small riot on the forum (and by riot I mean a public poll or something ) Just make sure the documentation is on point, so that everyone can easily see all the changes (even if there are hundreds of changes, we just need a list).

IbexHorn1 sounds good with 2X playback speed.

Hahahahaha... Legitimate concern, and yes, the towers definitely shouldn't be OP... Maybe they should be significantly expensive/strict build limit? Currently turtling isn't the most viable strategy though, although it should be just as viable as rushing. So the towers could actually help balance offensive vs defensive play. I tend to play very defensively myself, especially in early game, but it's really just a good way to get clobbered (although in a recent match one of my opponents referred to the 20 minute final battle in my base as "Stalingrad", which filled me with a little sense of pride , artillery towers would have made a difference, but the three invading armies would have defeated me either way).

Freestanding towers in general just weren't really a thing outside of the Roman Limes (although I don't know where that second pic from LordGood comes from. Is it actually an example of a freestanding tower?). But every civ has towers because it's an RTS convention. That said, artillery towers (attached to walls) were indeed a thing. Of all people, I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm kind of in favor of waving historical accuracy for these things because they are pretty darn cool (Alistair's reaction says it all), and they're not super unhistorical because artillery towers did exist... They shouldn't break the game of course. And if I understand correctly, they're only for Greco-Roman civs, so it would feel relatively believable.

@LordGood

A good question for which I don't really have a ready answer right now. Hannibal did indeed probably equip his troops with captured Roman chainmail, but I don't know about the possible use of it before the battle Cannae. Osprey's "The Carthaginians 6th–2nd Century BC" says this on the matter: Perhaps there may have been earlier uses of chainmail/ringmail through a Celtic connection. Celtic mercs would have almost definitely used it. But I'm really not certain. Carthaginian arms and equipment are still quite a hotly debated subject.

Oooh, great idea! Let's do it But, yeah, in hindsight, that suggestion is indeed a little too bloated. I'm still 100% in favor of a dedicated economic unit, simply called "labourer", or whatever. The lack of something that approaches a real economy and and real civilians is sorely missed by a lot of casual players and leaves competitive games with only one real strategy to win: spam the most efficient unit(s) as quickly as possible. There is a logical flaw in that reasoning, in the sense that a lot of casual players (who constitute the majority) want a more in depth economy. A lot of people think town building and economy management are super fun, and consider the military aspect only as the cherry on the cake. In single player, I often play to build the most beautiful, and realistic looking town, and only start wrecking the AI once I'm satisfied with my little kingdom. But without an economy and the associated hustle and bustle of a town, the game looks a little sterile for casual players, who want to see activity in their towns. We'd even like beautifications like statues, shrines, more unique monuments, even the ability to plant gardens etc... Doesn't even need to be functional. But having the option would greatly enhance the visual pleasure in SP, and enhance immersion. Granted, Delende Est goes a long way towards this, and does offer more replayability for SP, we'd just like to see some of that in vanilla as well (cult statues, villagers and slaves, mercenary camps, farmlands etc.). I understand that's not for everyone, but I'd like to see a little more compromise to facilitate SP. At least DE puts to use those amazing new stables, siege workshops, elephant stables and archery ranges, which would be super appreciated by single players in vanilla (diversifying the look of their towns), but would also please a lot of multiplayers (more interesting strategic choices to make). I'm not saying that the vanilla version of the game should become some sort of economy management game like Banished, but we could have a semblance of an economy, even if it's only visual stuff, like animated buildings, merchants selling wares in the market stalls, blacksmiths hammering at the anvil anytime you research a new tech, some scrawny hunched over NPC slave units scurrying back and forth with supplies and materials, children playing in front of their houses, stuff that doesn't actually affect gameplay but makes the towns look alive, even when your whole army is on the march somewhere. So, I'm not actually opposed to this if it means the towns will look more alive. It just shouldn't be dumbed down to the point of pointlessness. In this scenario building diversity and placement should become even more important, especially with regard to building farms only on suitable soils, logging camps being built in a forest, with their income determined by the number of trees in it's radius, mines and quarries, maybe even fishing huts, and maybe even storage yards to emulate a virtual resource cap (just like you have to build houses to increase your pop cap), with animated NPC suppliers going back and forth between the storage yards and resource and construction sites, just for the visual kick. Just brainstorming here, but it would make the game a lot more visually interesting/engaging, while at the same time eliminating the micro of economic units. It think it would make 0AD a more mature game, less constrained by the AoE legacy.

Man, Romans really need a special 4th tier... Imperial Phase... Mmmm... Ok, don't mind me, bye

I just connected to the lobby without a problem. Maybe it was fixed in the last 22min?

Server update in progress

Marcos Pérez Jiménez...

Hahaha, no problem. Alexander "Jiménez" mb looks way better now.

@Alexandermb For cavalry:

I think they can have similar/the same animations as the other factions. But for something more specific, here are a bunch of ideas from mostly Sudan, idle and ready mixed. Some of the melee ones would require the units to put down their shield, and let the shield lean against their body, freeing up their hands.

Looks nice, but I think it would look a bit better if he holds up the sarissa a little higher so that it doesn't look like he'll bump the butt into every low obstacle on the way.

Some idle and march poses that might be interesting:

Interestingly, someone on the facebook page posted this a week ago:

Honestly, that's supercool. All these animations really add a lot of personality... The "units" are slowly becoming characters...

Check it out, a Meroitic furnace: And another one: Experimental archaeology, a reconstructed furnace. High quality steel was produced Another one:

*not mine (I know you know they're not mine, and I understand what you mean, I just don't want to upset the people that did actually take those screens )

Go for it!

@Alexandermb Considering I read something about longer animations, With regard to the idle animation when the hoplite cleans his shield, it would look better if he first drives his spear into the ground, before releasing it to free his right hand to clean the shield. Currently the spear seems like its using a gyroscope to stay balanced or something Someone commented: