Servo

I only really want to play a realistic game, a combination of city building with atrocities (War if medieval civilization) but must continue to infinity. Infinity means s continuous engagement between factions on a certain era timetable. AoE 2 starts from dark age to imperial age but if you examine the sense of its mechanics it really is just a plain game not for realistic fun but rather competitive fun. Whereas 0ad stays in the same era and have a better realistic mechanics. Does it make sense to have units be still alive from dark age to imperial age? Are there only a couple of boars, sheep’s and animals from dark age to Imperial age? you take out phasing in 0ad, let technologies evolve over a small time frame then let opposing factions engage each other makes better sense imo.

I hate to say I’ve been playing AoE2 DE for awhile and still in single player but the game has no immersions for an infinity game. once all the trees are chopped down the enemy AI stalls. The reason is they are trading only gold. The AI don’t even fish afterwards to get food to keep making attacking units. I have to feed my enemy more with resources to stay in the game. 0ad is much much better in single player by a mile, 1 enemy AI can trade and continues to accumulate resources that are needed for continuity. 0ad women won’t wander towards my settlement to gather wood. Somehow 0ad has better good looking units, more building varieties. AoE 2 DE or any version is only good for multiplayer. You can’t rotate the map! You can’t play on Mac! Tower defense is much worse that they can be placed side by side. And tbh I hate that boar thing coupled with very less fauna. I don’t understand myself why I still keep playing it but probably just to test my newly upgraded A17 laptop. I hope A24 will release soon and can introduce some better gameplay on single player.

Does anyone find the heavy box formation good for the game?

Lag is still present even on single player which lags on a 1v1 on normal speed at maximum 300 population. I have no Knowledge in any programming but it seems there is no regulation on the engine to maintain a smoother performance. I end up playing on x2 speed. In total 600 population on a 1v1 single player mode is not regulated compared to multiplayer having 8 players with multiples of population on each player as well as bigger maps and multiple entities. But the occurrence on multiplayer seems regulated that it doesn’t lag assuming the net and pc are good. it seems that the engine is accelerating the units movement that behaves like accelerate-stop-go from 1 point to the destination point. About the post, I started with A21 I’m not sure maybe 5-6 years ago but the improvement is more on the stability and balance on the MP side. The arts is making more progress (really good and makes you comeback from time to time). Borg mod adds some flavor really but still having the same effect, improving the MP but still uncertain on the single player mode, though I haven’t really tested it fully on SP; thinking it might mess up the opposing AI when all resources are exhausted. The single player didn’t seem to gain enough advances, few mods bring some very encouraging factions and its arts as well as animations. I recently played a 2v2 on Corinthian Isthmus and my ally will eventually slaughter my protected fauna’s and gathering trees and minerals etc on my area. If I wall up to prevent them from taking my area’s resources, my ally AI will litter outside the protected walls/palisades. Somehow if you play a 2v1 on the same map the human player will always end up facing another AI in 1 half of the map and the other enemy AI is in the middle of the other side of the map. Why can’t it be that the human player be in the middle of the other side of the map and the 2 opposing allied enemy AIs be on the other side? Also Corinthian isthmus in random map made the beaches very plain flat compared to the better skirmish map but can only be used I guess on 1v1. i understand there are only few programmers in the volunteer dev team team but the 6 years time, the development is really slow imo. In the multiplayer, the competitiveness to the highest level are favoring the best, fast and precise clickers. The best micro managers and multitaskers will have the best advantages. The multiplayer needs hotkeys and flaring signals to at least diminish the slower players reliance on typing the communication between teammates. RoN has the best team coordinations using numbers 1-100 initially to communicate as well as flaring on possible strategic military activities. Slow typists will definitely a disadvantage on the higher level of team game. Somehow the A23 change on training units which can come out from a structure to any direction and not coming out from the front door makes the faster clicker have another advantage. I understand it ease up the bugs coming out from the structure that could get stuck from time to time but imo it only benefits the few good ones.

Any realistic features in the game will make it better, there’s no doubt. And any unrealistic feature is s turn off, there’s no doubt too...

Here is simple gameplay that “may” at least make the multiplayer game better imo. I’ve posted these things before already. Cap the number of each units (all units) that can be trained. For barracks and stable units depends on number of these structures. Corral might be prerequisite for stables building (Hannibal Barca has it). And perhaps someday armory and/or weapons are prerequisite for barracks. These things and any variation should reduce the pacing of the game and can introduce more strategies. This way small skirmishes before any final major battle can occur. This is just a very light presentation but needs some polishing. The players should be very careful of their actions and would not resort to spamming. Tbh I don’t mind having Citizen Soldiers but imo citizens can become soldiers and should come from the ranks of slaves, tradespeople etc. Barracks units just fight and Civilians just become militia or CS to defend the base, but can be used for an all out assault. And common, these structures that fire without any “range units” garrisoned is just ridiculous. Towers and forts that fire magically?! At least limiting the number of units moving could reduce lag. Man those siege units please and not just imaginary but rather organic operators that can be killed. Let us know the reason why these can’t be done and reason/s why these are not possible mechanics. Worried about game duration?

Yay! Yesss those things @Alexandermb! Maybe someday...

I can’t find any link to read as to how 0ad will eventually be finalized. The way I sense from most of the discussion/s, it seems the features have to be tailored to multiplayer gaming; AoE, TW, aom or the likes. So mostly altering the arts and few tweaks on gameplay. I also spent more than 1k hours on AoE 2 on SP and after that I realized it’s a boring game to infinity. And it’s happening to 0ad, just that imo 0ad is more pretty with very realistic arts. Though each person has each own liking. But imo simple mindset a game that involves realistic scenarios are the ones that make gamers immersed.Not much pressure to play, relaxing but challenging. A game that even wife will understand that his husband gamer should rather stay at home and playing such a very pretty game than going out to flirt. Anyhow, still hoping this game can be improved before I even vanish from this world.

No, I’m not angry. Just that such a pretty game seems to be stalled to its current state. Any alpha that might emerge seems to just feather features. There no depth tbh and not much interesting unique add ons. So if for example a feature/patch is developed and the vanilla decision makers don’t want it, this means the modders can’t use it? If that’s the case the one who makes the patch just washed his energy. Why not commit it so that mods “might” find it useful. Any resources an entity have should be given attention to either be useful or not. Some might be trashed but what if some are useful, like if not on vanilla perhaps on mods.

What I’m at a loss is that a free open source game can’t make multiple codes so that other mods can prosper as to what type of mechanics they want in their mods. Or is there really a shortage of programmers to do such things? Or those contributors are focusing on their own mechanics? Just for example, “wow” wants a battalion system, can the programmers not do it? Not much spare time to do? Any reason? Isnt if that each codes are independent to the vanilla that if some modders wants to try and use it, they can? tbh I don’t know nor understand how games are being developed but only those games (Game developers) for monetary reasons have rights for their own benefits. Imo all throughout the years since the game is being developed, the pacing is just to make the game playable and without regards to how to maximize the possibilities of making it distinguished from other games of almost the same genre.

What attracts me to 0ad are the arts and historical depictions.. The structures and units are really the best and being polished with the help of so many historical discussions. The animations are almost done except with the rams, ships, and walls/towers garrisoning. The mechanics imo is so so. There is no unique meta. CS does only little change from other games. The economics and logistical systems are just token. Sorry to say this again but I think there is no one in the dev team who has that genius mindset to make this game really great. I know these are voluntary contributors but imo no one lays out a concrete plan as to what direction the game is headed to. Are they really discussing things if they have the best ideas themselves as to what can make the game really good or just whatever comes?

I know it is city building but combat is really possible, by adjusting the villagers health, nutrition, hydration, stamina, rest and spirituality to do a siege on other settlements. Otherwise the maps need some resizing. If they can add faction and fix the AI to allow having multiple settlements, it’s be interesting Now it’s not possible because villagers can go back and forth trekking far distances to use multiple structures on each settlement or camp. The AI is too much automated. The good thing with DoM is that the settlement has lots of activities. Compared to 0ad which is too dry when you establish your base. Waiting for AI to attack and when resources are depleted, the enemy AI stalls. You have to pinch them so that they will attack from time to time. If you play to infinity, the most that you can do is getting those undying units to get promoted and just wait. Once you build everything the game is into a standstill. In DoM, when there is an attack an automated defense system is established but can manually realign defensive positions by disabling some defense structures. Every year attackers arrive to disrupt your activity. And in some “steam workshop (modded)” scenario, the attackers can increase as you increase your population. And depending on your pc capability your population could grow to infinity until you lag. But its combat system right now is just tower defense mechanics and quite annoying to beautify your settlement. The decay of resources is one awesome feature. Every tools, weapons, clothing, shields etc decays. Buildings need maintenance. Towers don’t fire magically, trees regrow, season changes. Villagers and animals are aging. And now dogs accompany hunters. There’s just too many close to realistic features. Once grains and pulses are harvested, the fields are empty. After fish is exhausted, it will take time for them to regenerate. Metals are classified into copper, bronze and iron, then steel.

I was trying to get back a little bit to the game because of HMS_Surprise call so i spectate some games. It was good that some settings like capture the relic as well as starting with very low resources are being introduced. Though my mindset is more focused on more realistic mechanics in SP mode, I found that by spectating an MP game, it’s kind of annoying that because of some of these unrealistic mechanics the game becomes frustrating. Take for example, teleporting resources to an ally can really mess up an interesting game. Although every team has each opportunity but the end result is not satisfactory imo. An unsuspecting target can get raided and the outcome of the game is already decided early on. I think if this game wants to be recognized by lot of gamers it has to have its own identity, a very unique and realistic mechanics. As I was playing Dawn of Man and already spent almost close to 1.6k hours, my mind is murmuring, if 0ad arts and other things are incorporated on this game, it’s going to be really the best game for decades. I don’t think more player’s care about playing time or the game should last just 30 mins on average on MP. This game needs to really focus on developing the single player mode with unique and realistic mechanics to really attract the largest numbers of gamers. I don’t think it’s the MP gamers, imo it’s the SP gamers.

Most of the players especially good ones use the spearmen as meat shields during fighting and swordsmen as just siege killers in P3. But some pros use champion swordsmen like Athens and naked fanatics for Gauls in P2 if there is a chance of surprise tactics. Mostly in A23 champions are not being used due to costs.on metals, with exceptions on cavalry from time to time. The game mostly end up with citizen soldiers (combined range [skirmishers/slingers/some archers] and spear men) as they only need food and wood/stones) and siege units in P3. Range citizen soldiers are faster gatherer on wood so mostly slow units (spearmen/swordsmen) gather stationary resources like metals and stones. Though you might need some spearmen early on woodcutters to defend against spear cavalry raids. Depends on situations you need to keep training units for counters or not counters. Just keep training units in any way!

Also a bit shabby video but I like to share this epic 4v4 game. It lasted 1-1/2 hours but uploaded for so many hours.

Does 0ad have a soundtrack compilation? I think if it has it should be posted in YouTube like this Dawn of Man soundtrack.

Np @sphyrth. Any comments are welcome. It will improve me. I’m quite disoriented with 0ad but I was just amazed with the quality of 0ad graphics and the music, and tbh a lot of features that’s why I just can’t leave 0ad easily and totally. Im not concentrating yet on very nice looking video but rather on helping to expose this game. In fact I posted it in DoM community forum. If I did not become a good 0ad player, I think I’m leading on the DoM as I’m the only one who can get past the most difficult modded DoM. Ofc because I am the highest number of hours played at more than 1.4k hours. You know I’m a crazy gamer. Though as in 0ad, DoM modders are also depending on what the devs have to offer. So I’m helping a couple of modders test their games before they finalize and make it public. If 0ad needs some testers on Mac, I’m just around the corner but I can’t go back to svn right now. @Angen I won’t forget your mod too. Ofc borg’s one also as it gives some more flavor to the vanilla.

Oh thanks for liking, and I was thinking of getting back some touch of 0ad. I forgot lots of it already when I tried to play it today and kind of becoming a rookie again. Probably I will do some videos when A24 comes out. This is the only way to contribute to this beautiful game. Btw I will ask permission from the modders if I can do video of them. DE, 0abc, mil AD and the rest. As I try to regain my touch I will concentrate on the single player first then probably the multiplayer later if I become competitive. I’m not sure if I still have some old replays that I can make videos. I knew I had a DE game which I built a very decent settlement. And a 0abc too. I’m not after monetary reasons to do this. Just for the love of gaming. I have sufficient time to do this but my gaming is divided between 0ad and DoM. Common players, there are more capable video makers here in the community. No need of those paid advertisers! In fact I’m really bad on pc thing but my setup now is just enough to at least do it.

Even without proficiency on making video, I will keep practicing to share my pc games. This one despite some erroneous narrations I just went through posting it. Bear with newbiness on video making This was my last multiplayer game in 0ad. And I already posted this replay before. Just some sort of advertising the game. I think my friend bbgotbanned played really bad on this game and keep on teasing his best friend Pudim. Instead of booming he could have doubled with landlord to neutralize chrtgr and game over. Making another CC to border push might not be a good idea on this case.

I think the key is don’t be shy and just keep talking as you said and gain more confidence. I found 1 0ad saved game which I already posted in the game replays and I will use it. When I replayed it back it feels so good listening to the music while watching. I think lots of 0ad players especially the pros can be of big help by doing YouTube of their very interesting game.

Oh I thin I can do it by running a saved game, at the same time use OBS and start narrating. I will try it. Tbh I had difficulty watching the pro games thru json.

But seriously I have so many 0ad interesting saved games that I want to post in YouTube but idk how. I’m using OBS. But I will try to find out. Somehow these saved games don’t lag when you replay it. Also I hope there are mechanics from DoM gameplay that might interest the devs.

You had mod something I think. One day I hope when I become proficient and for the love of the game I can also make my own 0ad YouTube video. Like this one, on DoM. Bear with me and tbh I’m not snorting something. A Filipino voice hahah.

I hope I can improve like @sphyrth someday and record videos. I’m trying some Dawn of Man and quite poor on everything including pronunciation and grasp of vocabulary I think @nani can do some videos too! He did one before and it was nice!

0ad has the characteristics to become one of the best RtTS game if not the best of all. Imo the direction and objective of development just don’t follow towards greatness. Mimicking AoE or AoM or whatever current games of the same mechanics won’t make it better at all. 0ad has to have a really unique mechanics to become a really good game. Whatever issue the dev team have, the progress is really slow. Only the Arts side seems to have a continuous output. Outputs that are just being placed in a storage because most of them can’t effect and not much needed in the vanilla. Multiplayer is fun not because the game is fun but rather the players are fun to be with and fun to play with. Other than that the game is about who click fast and precise, he becomes good. Single-player mode is nice in the beginning but in the later part it becomes so dry. When you and the opponent AI finished chopping down all the tress I feel like my base is a desert. Again I would say a realistic game is imo the best route to greatness. Dawn of Man might seem to be a simple single player game but it’s realistic features are the ones that make the players immersed. The structures are not as polished as 0ad but the mechanics is just a nice experience to have. It makes you think more than just clicking and spamming units. The chance of losing the game is much much higher than 0ad. Modded Scenarios game are abundant and some of them are really torment.