Vantha

The slope in the screenshot is the steepest of the whole map (and lays on the very edge). There are no cliffs (in the sense of exposed rock) at all in the area, only a few hills. I'd estimate that more than 95% of the map is still fully passable and buildable. But the same also happens on the flatter hillsides; it goes wrong basically as soon as there's an incline.

I've run into an issue while creating the map for the tutorial campaign. Most of the terrain is quite even, but there are also some hilly parts. Now, the problem is that vegetation props don't align their rotation the slope. (I am aware that entity templates can be configured to do exactly that, like rocks and ores for example. But these props simply aren't entities, only actors). This works fine for most of them, but looks very wrong for low and wide actors (in my case underbrushes and grass): I used especially those two quite a lot for the rest of the map, so simply leaving out them in affected areas is not a option. And there aren't any good replacements for them either. Any ideas how I could work around this?

An idea I had a while ago (that would provide a practice opportunity to player) is to add some sort of "coach". It watches games and every now and then sends notifications to remind the player of something they forgot or could improve. For example: "Your wood production is struggling to meet demands while your storage is overflowing with stone. Move over some workers from the stone mines to the forest", "You have reached your current population capacity and can't train any more units, build more houses to increase it.", "A significant portion of your units is idle. Have them work at all times for maximum efficiency." I believe this could really help players new to the RTS genre with the multitasking and all of the casual single players. I've heard from a number of new players that they found the game way too hard (and it was for me too when I first started playing). It's not as hard to implement as it might seem, could be expanded on by the more competitive multiplayer community and even be made into a "challenge mode", similar to what @Lion.Kanzen suggested. And, of course, it would also come in handy for the unguided sections in this tutorial campaign. But let's keep this thread on-topic. I'll probably open a dedicated one once I get to it.

What do you mean? These campaigns are fully playable, no?

Me too, but that's sadly nowhere near feasible right now. Such introductions to our civs would certainly be nice to have. And, as you said, wouldn't even require that much work. Let's keep it in mind for the future.

I'm not sure I get it... if there's no story, then how is it different from an ordinary game?

No story and just single games? That defeats the whole purpose of a campaign, right?

What about the idea of practice games in between that we talked about at the beginning? I mean, they are present to some degree in the current plan: The player learns how to play through the village phase in scenario 2, so in scenario 3 the instructions only start after completing that (and reaching the town phase). Before this point, the player just repeats (and practices) what he learned in the previous game. In scenario 4, the same is done for the town phase as well. Do you think that's enough?

Scenarios 1, 2, and 3 all take place at the city and its surroundings. So, I'm hoping to be able to use the same map for all of them (the one that I'm creating right now). But we will only see whether that is actually possible once we get to the concrete implementation. Scenario 4 will definitely require a different map, though, if we decide for the idea with Hemeroscopium as the final target, since that city needs to be situated further to the North (somewhere not covered by the first map). But it might be possible to reuse parts of the first one for it.

I think the cause could indeed an IP change. A while ago, I had a router that would get assigned a new IP address on every reboot. My connection back then was pretty weak and I had the habit of restarting it before reconnecting to a game I was disconnected from (just don't question it; it actually helped with the lag). After doing so, I - as far as I remember - pretty consistently rejoined as observer the first time (and would only be assigned to the open player slot after leaving and joining a second time - without any reboots in between).

Sharing some more progress on the map... I'd estimate I'm about halfway there.

Yeah, but wouldn't it still be more exciting to fight e.g. the Battle of Cannae?

Here is what I suggest for scenario 4: I think the campaign should end in a big battle. 0ad is a game about warfare after all, so that's what people install the game for. Preferably, the player should get to carry out an attack this time. Mainly, because the tutorial should teach how to do that (and in scenario 3, the player only defends). But also because it simply a lot more fun from a role-playing perspective. However, we need a target. It can't be the Iberians this time since we made peace with them in scenario 3. The obvious (and ideal) choice would be Rome, but they weren't present in the region at the time at all (and I'll explain why that's important later). Now, it's not as impossible as it may seem to find historical events that suit our needs. Because here is what happened after Hasdrubal founded Carthago Nova: The city of Massalia was actually quite an important power in the region (and itself has a pretty interesting backstory, it was even candidate for the subject of this campaign at some point). Plus, it's Greek (and so its colonies), which allows us to include yet another popular ancient civilisation that players might have prior knowledge of. Of the said towns, Hemeroscopium ("Hemeroskopeion" in Greek) seems like the best choice (it's at least the one I was able to find the most about online). And it has the best-sounding name . So, I'd make it the final objective of the scenario to conquer this town. Now, it was not as big as one would wish, so the if there was a battle it was probably quite small and we have no historical record of it. That'd be the only drawback. However, after taking over the city we can have the player sign the Ebro Treaty (which among other cities was requested from Rome by Massalia). On the one hand, it prohibited Hasdrubal from marching further and taking more cities, but also granted much of the entire Iberian peninsula to Carthage (which is what Hasdrubal set out to do at the beginning of the campaign). And we can emphasise his diplomatic skills again. That would be such a satisfying end in my opinion.

But I wouldn't force the player into losing the battle either. Maybe when the attackers realize they can't breach the walls they simply retreat (they've been repelled, but far from defeated). That way it makes more sense why both sides are willing to sign the treaty.

I think it's a great idea. I was originally not planning on teaching the player the diplomacy system, but this is a nice opportunity to do so. We could make scenario 3 focus on fortifying the city and repelling an assault. But in the end actually negotiate an alliance with the attackers: For instance, gifting them some food to help with a current shortage (and maybe arranging some intermarriages). And in exchange the player gets access to the Iberian embassy building in the next scenario (therefore the ability to hire mercenaries) to use in the large attack in the end (against some Roman target).