Vantha

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).

Alright, I revised and updated our old outline. Here it is, to get everyone up-to-date with what we've got so far: Some notes: the first scenario is meant to teach basic controls and UI so we can fully focus gameplay strategy in the other ones. It's only supposed to last somewhere 5 and 10 minutes. The second, third and fourth scenario cover the Village, Town, and City phases respectively. It is possible to set custom victory conditions from scenario scripts and the idea is to make it the winning goal of the second scenario to reach Town Phase, and of the third one to reach City Phase. And to let them build on each other, so at the beginning of the third and fourth one just tell the player "Do what you did before." and start guiding again once the player has reached a point he hasn't been at before. For technologies, my idea is to not individually instruct to research every single important one, but rather tell the player "This structure has important technologies. Periodically check for available ones here and research them as soon as you comfortably can." and remind them to do so if they forget about it. Nothing is set into stone. Especially the story might need some refinement. Any ideas how we could include Mastia? And do you think it's an issue that we have Hasdrubal the Fair fighting battles? Any other suggestions? (Personally, I'd not do more than 4 scenarios, though, or else the length could scare off players)

As far as I'm able to tell, there is no evidence for Mastia being situated on the exact peninsula. The argument is that, firstly, if he could Hasdrubal would likely have founded the city on an existing settlement rather than building it from the ground up, simply because it'd save a lot of time, effort, and resources. And secondly, given how naturally well protected the spot is, it's unlikely that the indigenous (Tartessian) tribes wouldn't had made use of it in some way before the Carthaginians arrived. In any way, Hasdrubal's encounter with the local tribes were mostly friendly and he was known for favoring diplomatic measures over military ones. That's why he is called 'the Fair'. I wrote an outline for the very first scenario a few pages back: And this is my old plan for the next three scenarios: The question is whether, and if so, how to exactly embed Mastia into our story? To get back to the map, how do you think the textures fit together? How noticeable is the mix of two biomes?

Honestly, I'm not so keen on repainting everything a second time. I think the current textures blend together quite well already, but my opinion here might be biased by all the effort I put into it. Here is the map in its current state: carthago_nova.pmpcarthago_nova.xml What do you think?

Should I continue painting with those textures or switch over to the Aegean-Anatolian and later replace them with said Iberian variants?

Oh, actually, I already did quite a bit of painting with the new textures, using a palette of Aegean-Anatolian grass and dirt and some sand and cliff textures from the desert biome (mostly the Persian variants). I think it works well enough:

Yeah, that's essentially our plan. We already have a list of features to teach in each scenario (a couple of pages back in this thread) as well as an idea how to wrap a story around it. That means, at the moment, we're at step two: creating the scenarios - for which we first need maps.

RPGs maybe, where storytelling is the primary focus. But to me RTSs don't feel like movies, even in campaign mode.

I don't think its comparable to movies. But you're right, players will click away if Hasdrubal starts talking in Phoenician. i believe that's something we should provide as well. A small page called something like "historical background" that explains the campaign's historical context. And helps players embed the story told into their existing knowledge (Carthage, Rome, Punic Wars, Hannibal, ...) Well, I'd actually prefer this. It's more like paging through a history book. But I'll leave that decision up to you writing minds.

Do we really need dialogue to tell the story? Certainly a hot take, but I find cutscenes (especially with voiceovers) in RTS's very awkward. Why would Carthaginian generals talk in English? And with the moments of silence in between shouted lines, speeches sound very unnatural and feel everything else but "real". If anything, it takes away from the immersion for me. But I have a strong suspicion I may be the only one here who thinks this way

There is no separate Persia biome, right? Are you referring to the Persian textures of the desert biome? Because those are pretty much what I needed (even though Persia is even further away from Carthago Nova than the Aegean Sea / Anatolia)

I just tried to repaint the map using the new textures, but I can't seem to reproduce what I had earlier. The overall color scheme of the new Agean-Anatolian biome is a bit too grey and white for Southern Spain, I'd need something with a slight yellow-orange tint. I'm especially missing the 'medit_shrubs_golden' and 'medit_cliff_italia' textures. Attempting to correct it with the 'Ambient Color' doesn't look very natural. My best solution is to borrow some textures from the desert biome, but those were obviously colored from a different palette, which results in a small, but definitely noticable color disharmony. Any ideas/tips/advice?

I'm aware of the tool, but I'm afraid it alone won't cut it in many places. While great-looking, the new textures can't really be matched 1:1 to all the old ones.

Ah, darn it. I indeed used the old textures, which means I'll have to repaint everything. How annoying. But, I guess, good thing you told me now rather than later. Imagine if I only found out after completing the entire map. And, I gotta say, the new textures look a lot sharper and aesthetically pleasing. Very good work. Yeah, that's more or less what I used already. In fact, I also found the Aleppo Pines ugly and mostly used pine_maritime and pine_black (as well as their variants) instead.

I completed the topography and started painting the terrain and placing some vegetation. Here is the portion of the map I did so far:

This is a very important topic in my opinion. I fully support the team's decision. I believe it's right to resist the temptation of the potential development boost it could provide. It'll prove to be the right decision in the long run. @Itms worded it really well. Part of what I find makes 0ad so great is the fact that so many talented individuals from all around the world got together and invested so many selfless hours of work to create an awesome game for anyone to play completely for free. 0ad's value goes far beyond the software and gameplay experience. Imagine a future where projects whose development was assisted by generative AI (to any extent - be it just a few textures) are required to be explicitly labelled as such. Most AI-generated content online is already frowned upon. A small label like this could significantly (terrifyingly) devalue the reputation and history of the game. And that would be incredibly sad, and simply irresponsible towards this great legacy. Generative AI is a fascinating, and really capable technology, I'd be the last one to deny that. But I think it's a bit ... pointless. Creating something impressive is supposed to take effort. That's what makes it impressive in the first place, no? Regarding the encyclopedia, I therefore share @ShadowOfHassen's views; we shouldn't and won't use generative AI for texts or images at all.

It mostly requires pretty straightforward JavaScript code, I can take care of that. What I want to do too, though, is implement a way for the trigger scripts to query for some non-simulation-related information (to detect certain hotkey presses for instance) as well. This would allow us to polish the tutorial (especially the very first one) a whole lot better. But it requires modifying the engine code - which is a bit trickier. Will do.

Yeah. I'm still working on the map every now and then. My expectations might maybe be too perfectionistic, which is why it takes me so long. Of course, doing it all in one weekend was a bit too optimistic. And I won't try to estimate when I'll be done since that has gone wrong enough times in the past. But once the map is finished we can get right into writing and scripting.

Is there a ticket/issue for it yet?

Just to reiterate, I went with the Youhzhou Cavalry in the PR. Is everyone ok with this? By the way, during my research I actually came across an old post on this forum suggesting them as well: https://wildfiregames.com/forum/topic/14075-0-ad-rise-of-the-east-mod/?do=findComment&comment=287382

I finished painting the map's topography: carthago_nova.pmp I want to try myself at completing the full map this weekend. I haven't made a map for before, but it seems fun.