RolandSC2

Hi, Is there one?

The first and easiest bit of advice is to watch your replays, see where things went wrong, and think of just one or two things you can do differently next time. You can work on something different after each replay you watch- no need to tackle everything at once.

Many considerate, talented, and intelligent people are taking the time to respond to this thread. I wish you weren't treating them like this, even if you think you were wronged.

I think a majority of 0AD battles are also won by melee combatants. I wouldn't square an all-ranged army against a ranged/pikemen mix and expect to defeat a player with equal skill. Most players, however, will likely agree that ranged units need some balancing work.

Has there ever been a cavalry scouting unit? Perhaps food-only, and with either no attack, low attack, a speed bonus, camoflauge (and possibly a unit to spot/reveal camoflauged units), or some other characteristic that makes it work as a scout, but not as an attacker. Something to give players extra chances to use their time and attention to gain an incremental edge.

The fact that you can see an opponent's territory expand with each phase (as long as they have been scouted at least once previously) removes an incentive to scout throughout the game. It could be more interesting if an opponent's territory boundaries didn't have that visibility.

The rank of a soldier appears as a chevron on the unit portrait, and the unit itself will dawn more visually impressive armor each time its rank increases. Some players overlook that a unit's resource-gathering rates decrease as its rank increases (I don't completely understand the justification). Armor and attack increases are more intuitive. Part of me doesn't want to encourage garrisoning units, when they could otherwise be out on the map forcing the player to make decisions with them. This garrisoning tactic also doesn't give the opponent any chance to counter it, short of destroying the barracks where the units are being trained, and counterability is an important characteristic in games like this. Perhaps in the future some mod could introduce a mobile unit that either temporarily increases the ranks of the units around it, or slowly increments the experience of those units. This sort of unit would both keep more units active on the map and allow opponents to counter the play by "sniping" the aura-bearing unit.

Borg- was random. I may have been also, but at the time I was playing Iberians to dissuade my opponent from cavalry rushing. (moderately successful).

Capturing siege equipment could be reviewed as a game mechanic (and either removed, or mapped to an explicit trigger), since no high level player would: 1) attempt it during combat, 2) leave an engine unattended outside of combat, and since it causes headaches for everyone else. My vote is to make attack the units' default action, not some meaningless capture task.

Another thing inhibiting early combat engagements is the limited availability of unit-producing structures that can be built within proximity of an opponent (excepting the CC, which isn't a reasonable tactic for rushing due to its high cost and the fact it only produces basic units). The military colony is a reasonable option for pre-P3 rushing strategies, but only two civilizations have access to it. The Roman army camp is another reasonable option for expanding late-game strategies, but only the Romans have access to it. Players would have more options for early game combat if every civilization had access to a structure like the military colony in P2, or a structure like the Roman army camp in P3. These structures should be powerful enough to allow the aggressor to win the game if he/she executes the strategy well and the opponent does not scout it (or reacts inappropriately after scouting it), but risky enough that the investment severely hampers the aggressor's chance of winning if the strategy is poorly executed, or if the opponent scouts and reacts appropriately. It would help to know what proportion of games end in each phase (or window of time) and also to know the community's idea of the ideal proportion. For example: The current proportion might be 5/15/80 (5% of games ending in P1, 15% ending in P2, 80% ending in P3), but the community ideal might be 15/35/50. Thoughts on this?

I noticed some bloke lose 64 points on his first game against a similarly rated player. The victor went from 1204 to 1219, and the loser went from 1200 to 1136. Seems like losing that many points could be discouraging at that point in the player's experience (his/her first game).

RolandSC2 vs Stockfish Two close games, played 8/13 and 8/17. ccc_roland_stockfish_g2.zip ccc_roland_stockfish_g1.zip

Many trees were lost during the making of this replay. roland_borg.zip

Two games between RolandSC2 and DoctorOrgans on Mainland with a snowy biome. roland_doctororgans_g1.zip roland_doctororgans_g2.zip

Thanks, Elexis. I found the log files, but you are right that they have been overwritten and contain no data from the event yesterday. I can still furnish them as needed. 1 - The rejoining player connected and then disconnected (after "losing connection" countdown--without kick/ban), but the game still did not progress. 2 - The rejoining player attempted to rejoin again and was banned during connection. Next, all observers were banned, but the game did not progress.