chrstgtr

Hmmm. I discovered the problem from using rally points. But now that I think of it, could we get around this problem by having units rally to a spot close to the forest and then shift clicking them resource collect the forest? Not ideal. But It would be helpful to avoid orphaning large units of spawning units.

It is a problem because instead of having units walk to the forest where I have a storehouse units will spawn from the CC and walk to the tree that is closest to the CC, which may or may not be close at to other units, storehouses, etc. Instead they should walk to where I ordered them and then find a replacement tree. It appears this has already been fixed, though. https://code.wildfiregames.com/rP25776 This is already implemented. It shows shows idle units in the bottom left. You just have to pay attention and/or constantly press the period button to select idle units. You can use shift to give secondary orders too.

Just played 2.5 games with @ValihrAnt and I just want to say that this is going to be a really nice alpha. Amongst other things, I was really impressed by the art team's work and the the programing's team's improvements to pathfinder/pushing. Good job, all. One bug to note, if units' rally point is assigned to a res that isn't available then the units go to the closest available of the same type of res from where they currently are.

In SP, you can set the difficulty lower. After all, making the game easier to play is setting the difficulty lower even if your AI opponent is still listed as "hard." You are very explicitly taking away skill aspects from the game. That is per se diminishing the amount of skill required to play well. Again, at most, it is 2 clicks every ~10 seconds. This isn't clicking as many times as you can for as long as you can. If you don't want to click, you can just not train units 'all the time' then you can just not train units for awhile. Or you could train larger batches. Or, apparently now, use a very good but not perfectly efficient auto-queue feature. Making the auto-queue perfectly efficient (which was the request that this discussion directly flowed from) is clearly just a way to make the game easier to play by eliminating a large portion of what playing is. It's simply a way to make the game easier to play, which is apparently favored by some people who play SP. SP can simply make the game easier by adjusting difficulty. MP players cannot simply tell their opponents to play worse.

Clicking 2 buttons (to select all barracks and the unit type) every ~10 seconds isn't fast. The game consists of essentially two elements: economy and military. And, the economy is composed of essentially two parts: gathering and spending resources. What you propose is to eliminate roughly 1/4 of the entire game. A large portion of that 1/4 will already be eliminated by allowing units to be auto-trained. But you want more. Equalizing automated gameplay (that could literally be done while you sleep) with the play of someone who puts forth much more effort (which is still just two clicks every ~10 seconds) should not be done. I really don't get the casual vs. MP divide on matters that involve skill like this. Casual players can still play their game as they always have. They just won't be as "good" as they could be, which they purport to not even care about. It's almost like proposals like this seek seek to eliminate any aspects of the game where skill does exist. Meanwhile, changes like this will diminish any "competitive" gameplay that does exist. If casual players don't care about doing micro for efficiency they can easily pick game play settings (such as high starting res) that eliminate the need to be efficient.

Just because it is possible to automate something doesn't mean that is should be automated. For example, someone could write a script that does a perfect eco build. If that script was available to everyone then it wouldn't be a problem by your criteria. However, such a script would fundamentally change the game (for the worse) by eliminating all eco considerations. Players should benefit for doing the effort themselves.

+1

No, I don't know how to do patches and lack any coding skills. Hanni was Hannibal_Barca. He is a moderator in the multiplayer lobby.

This has been a problem for a while, and it can be a big problem because you can't gauge how many units you are being attacked by. Some players, especially Hanni, used to abuse this to conceal the fact that they have many bolts/cata.

Maybe if you consider a "tsunami" to be 1 ram, 2 spears, 2 skirms, and 13 women, "pouring" to be a single wave, and "at minute 5" to mean around minute 7. If you can't defend against that then you bigger problems than how many p1 and p2 buildings are required for your enemy to go p3. If you don't build a proper base then you won't have the benefits that come along with it, including population cap space from houses, men from barracks, military upgrades from blacksmiths, trading ability from markets, etc. Instead the current setup limits player strategy by forcing a specific build order. Just let players decide and the game will become far less predictable than it is now where I know every player builds a lot of houses, storehouses, and farms in p1, a market, blacksmith, and two other buildings in p2, and a siege factory in p3.

I don't believe in unnecessarily limiting player choice. There are pros and cons of constructing each building (and not constructing each building). Let the players decide what they want and what strategy they want to use. And for that matter, I would prefer there be no building requirements at all. If a player wants to go p3 with 20 pop, fine. If a player wants to rush p3 without a market, blacksmith or other p2 buildings, fine. If you want players to make more types of buildings then the buildings themselves should be more worthwhile. Besides there aren't enough buildings to force everyone to build different buildings. If that was required everyone would have 3 of 5 (or however many buildings are available) and everyone's build order/base would look very similar.

No, they're terrible. But there are fixes on the way. https://code.wildfiregames.com/D3781

I've always liked how pierce countered ele and hack countered rams. It requires players to have diverse units in order to properly fend off attacks (i.e., having ele and rams be vulnerable to different types of attacks discourages single unit spam).

Totally off topic, but I agree. Right now players don't make sword because melee is generally used as a meatshield and no one wants to waste metal training units that never even make it to enemy lines. If swords are quicker then they would more quickly close the gap and engage in fighting where they could do real damage.

If all range units move at the same speed then archers will always win with good micro. It will be the same as camels in a23

Of course they have different gathering rates. But that isn't a bad thing. It introduces different dynamics into the game. It introduces choice. It introduces strategy. Let players build more storehouses. Or research techs. Or just make different units that are quicker gathers. Or make units that counter quicker gathers, so you can try to rush the other player that is going for boom. What you propose eliminates all of the aforementioned choice and strategy. One of the main lessons to be learned from a23-->a24 is that making everything the same and uniform is a stale, lazy way to balance and is actively disliked by players. What we have now isn't broken. Let's not try to fix what already works.

I don't see any need for this. There is already an incentive to build more local drop sites to limit shuttling distance. Likewise, you can just research basket techs to carry more res. I also don't see why it unit speed matters--if a player makes all of one unit type then that unit type should be rushable. A properly built eco will address all the problems you describe, and if a player doesn't do it then they will have a worse eco. To me, all this does is necessarily take out strategy in what units are trained, what buildings are built, and what techs are researched.

I'm fine with the way trading works now. It reflects demand insofar as players actually use it--less desired resources fetch a low trade-in value, high desired resources fetch a high trade-in value, less desired resources demand a low purchase price, and high desired resources demand a high purchase price. I'm also fine with the way traders work now--they are a long-term investment that is very expensive on the front end but ultimately very efficient at generating resources. I would like to see the speed tech comeback as there doesn't seem to be any good reason to take away player choice, but that is another matter.

Players don't build regularly build army camps this alpha. This alpha army camps can't produce siege and as a result are only only useful if they can shoot arrows at enemy units. That means that camps are only useful if they are placed in an area that will be the center of fighting. Except it is difficult to place buildings somewhere there is constant fighting since your builders will get killed in the fight and the defending player can more quickly spam to a location in their own territory. This ticket (https://code.wildfiregames.com/D3668) will also make army camps less useful because the arrows won't even be as effective anymore. Camps can be built in enemy territory for offensive purposes. In order to actually use camps for that offensive purpose they should have the ability to produce siege. Otherwise, it is just a bad version of colony.

Many people are having difficulty when trying to download and install mods, which make them less played. How can you add a mod to the download mod/install list in the game menu? Specifically, I want to have Vali's mod added

It is better to start them off at the difference that make sense to balance the units and then offer speed tech. Otherwise you just make archers OP until a jav based civ can afford the tech. Units should start balanced without techs and end balanced with all techs. @ValihrAnt’s mod balanced archers well.

Making a game purposely annoying shouldn't be a result of intentional design. Palisades should be much more expensive than they are now, which is about as close to free as you can get from a resource cost and build time perspective, and much more quickly destroyed. Area damage to palisades has been suggested many times by many people and it makes total sense to me.

Turn times are a problem even when the defender doesn't have archers. Rushers are unable to do hit and run attacks now because it takes too long to turn around rushing units and defenders only have to hit h to kill rushing units. If the problem was only archers then players would still effectively rush non-archer civs but that isn't happening. As I have said elsewhere, though, you are correct that archers make the problem particularly acute.

Just providing feedback on the mod itself--I played a couple games on the mod and I am a huge fan. Game is much, much more balanced, and a lot of fun. A lot of the strategies that disappeared in a24 like rushing are possible. I encourage everyone to give it a try.

This is another solution to a different "problem" that we don't know will work. Reverting to old train times will work to fix the problems that were introduced in a24. What you propose is a larger change to the whole meta, which is fine to propose but an entirely different topic. Any larger changes to the meta should be made from a point that already know works (i.e., a23 training time) and merits of your proposal should be considered within that context.