oshron

huh?

yeah, only hannibal's own elephant survived the crossing of the alps

perhaps there could be a definitive number of units in all? in Empire Earth, for random maps, you could adjust the amount of units that can be on the map for all players, but there's an absolute maximum, which is divided between players. so, for example, if you set it to 1200 units in all and there were two players, each one would have a maximum population limit of 600, whereas with three players, the max would be 400. unlimited population is VERY tempting, but i say place the maximum number of units that can be placed at 1200 (if the population is divvied up between players) or 800 (if there's a single limit for every player) but to, again, limit the player's population capacity by the number of houses, civic centers, and perhaps select other buildings (like maybe fortresses). this way, the player has to work for their population, which gives them incentive to expand; in empire earth, you never had to build houses because they didn't provide population (but DID give you a little morale boost, but only if they were near a town center) and your entire population capacity was given to you right from the beginning. in contrast, AOE and its spin-offs (im most familiar with AOM) start you off with, like, 5-10% of your maximum population limit, so you had to build houses and town centers to unlock more of that population and forge larger and stronger armies, which honestly makes more sense: you'd expect a civ with a large infrastructure to have larger armies, as opposed to a tiny village with a single barracks training a hundreds-strong army. the amount of houses you can build should be regulated by the number of civic centers you control, but there should also be an absolute limit on houses (say, 25-30) which will prompt you to capture enemy houses as well, which could give more depth to gameplay

personally, i think it would be good to control player population by letting houses and civic centers provide population, but making the number of population slots which can be unlocked be controlled in the pre-game menu. this way, even in games with unlimited population, there's less chance of the game causing lag: namely, let there be limits on the number of those buildings that can be built by each player, but population can be further expanded by capturing other buildings from other players. this may give an interesting aspect of gameplay where players may want to enact a scorched earth policy and delete their own buildings before the enemy can capture them. also, if its not planned already, i still say that civic centers should only be able to be built on top of settlements like in AOM

well the romans of at least one time had a camelry force (its where the word "dromedary" comes from, iirc), so it would be nice to have at least SOME camel units, even if they aren't used as part of regular gameplay

what does everyone think would be some good demigod/champion units that i could include for the romans? these can derive from the entirety of roman history rather than just from trajan's era, because Godstorm focuses on mythology rather than absolute history (though is supposed to be accurate otherwise). Praetorian Guards are pretty much a must, so those'll probably go in for either Quirinus or Mars (probably Quirinus since he basically represents deified emperors), but another one that i planned for inclusion as the champion unit available to all romans is the Gladiator, which would be armed with a trident and have a special net attack whereby he throws a net over a single infantryman to tangle them up, leaving them open to attack for a few seconds

exactly; it would be like making models so detailed that you can see individual soldiers blink. thats great for games like Call of Duty or Grand Theft Auto, but not for RTSs; even with its super-detailed cinematic models, AOM didn't have such detail as lip movement for when the characters talk

i think what was done with Age of Mythology would be better, with a menu to the side where all the campaigns and their missions are displayed and can be selected, while the bottom edge of the screen is devoted to exiting out of the menu (or going to other menus) and a description of the selected scenario, while the rest of the screen shows an image relevant to the scenario, such as artwork of a major event in the scenario (for example, one based on the trojan war could have the horse approaching the gates of the city), or a map displaying the progress of the campaign over a geographic area

again, here's what i say: Julius: if there's lots of new units and updates to the military systems of the game Jericho: if there's lots of improvements to the buildings, particularly if there's a better wall system Jerusalem: default otherwise because of its importance in the region

jericho was extant during the timeframe, iirc, and is otherwise just notable as a famous ancient city

figured as much tbph, this board isnt as versatile as some others, but it honestly doesnt need to be. in fact, my own message board is alot clunkier i based the roman gods here (most of them, at least) on ones that were assigned a flamen historically, but i also didnt want to just copy the greek gods, hence why a fair number of the gods in there aren't ones that were part of the planned greek pantheon. i made Quirinus (Romulus), Vesta, and Mars the good, neutral, and evil roman gods, respectively, based on the roman foundation myth: that Romulus and Remus were the sons of a Vestal virgin who was raped by Mars. so Quirinus (Romulus) is cast as the good guy and Mars as teh villain even though he was much more likeable than Ares, with Vesta as a "filler" neutral god. of the major gods, Vesta is the only one that wasn't assigned a flamen maior (at least according to wikipedia ). and, of course, the legend phase gods are all deified emperors. Indiges (Aeneas) is given to Quirinus because of the alternative Roman foundation myth, that Aeneas fled the destruction of Troy and eventually settled in what would become Rome; his myth unit, the Vrykolakas, is supposed to be in vague reference to the she-wolf that nursed Romulus and Remus, part of the reason why its only available to Quirinus (i actually based the minor god setups for alot of deities based on what myth units would therefore become available to each major god, like Poseidon for teh greeks getting the minor gods that grant the Cyclops and Minotaur based on mythology, as well as all of the greek naval myth units) EDIT: i decided to go back and fix up the list with indentations for easier future reference

i think it should be Julius only if theres lots of additional military content/reforms in alpha 10. as suggested before, Jericho could be the name of alpha 10 if a proper wall system is implemented

personally, i think that--where applicable--it would be good to focus campaigns on different divergences, so there could/would be separate campaigns for the poleis and macedonians. with separate ones for each, more detail can be given in each campaign instead of whittling it down to the more famous battles for each. to give an example, the greek campaign in Empire Earth had: the migration of the Anatolians to Greece (possibly fictional) the migration of the Daanans to Greece (possibly fictional) the Trojan War (possibly fictional) the rise of Athens under Theseus (possibly fictional) the Peloponessian Wars in Pericles' Athens Alexander's rise to power in the Greek proper the battles of Granicus and Tyre the battle of Gaugamela and the conquest of the Persian empire for a strictly Alexander-centered campaign, the opening scenario could focus on his rise to power, then on to his biggest early successes, separate scenarios for granicus and tyre, then major victories against persia and the conquest of that empire, and a closing scenario focusing on his indian campaign, with a closing cinematic (or what have you) detailing alexander's eventual death i think focusing each campaign on a particular historical figure would be (arguably) the best decision, and also a good tribute to AOK, which 0ad was originally going to be a mod for, iirc. another thing idea ive thought of is that, where applicable, there could be unofficial releases of campaigns which are directly adapted from older RTS games, like the aforementioned Greek campaign from Empire Earth, but also possibly the Korean campaign from Empire Earth 2, the Roman campaign from the expansion pack of Empire Earth, and the different campaigns of Age of Empires and Age of Kings, particularly the Attila campaign from AOK

since the romans are on-topic, i thought i'd just repost what i have for the romans so far, kinda for quick reference on my part since all the information i have otherwise is on an external harddrive: Major Gods Quirinus (deified Romulus) Vesta (goddess of the hearth) Mars (god of war) Minor Gods Pomona Available to: Quirinus, Vesta Phase: Town Myth Units: Arachne (giant spider, or possibly spider-woman, that uses webs to tangle up enemies) Janus Available to: Vesta, Mars Phase: Town Myth Units: Automaton (metal soldier that can heal wounded automatons and even repair dead ones if they are fast enough) Vulcan Available to: Quirinus, Mars Phase: Empire Myth Units: Cacus (fire-breathing giant) Augustalis (deified Augustus) Available to: Vesta, Mars Phase: Legend Myth Units: Charybdis (sea monster that creates whirlpools), Laistrygonian (cannibal giant) Bacchus Available to: Quirinus, Mars Phase: City Myth Units: Faun (goat-man bard that boosts allied morale with music, and can be upgraded to have a powerful sound-based attack, "Panic") Julius (deified Caesar) Available to: Quirinus, Mars Phase: Legend Myth Units: Gigantes (giant myth unit that looks like a half-man half-dragon) Neptune Available to: Quirinus, Vesta Phase: City Myth Units: Khalkotaur (giant bronze bull), Siren (ocean nymph that uses sound to paralyze ships) Cybele Available to: Vesta, Mars Phase: City Myth Units: Ladon (multi-headed serpent) Venus Available to: Quirinus, Vesta Phase: Empire Myth Units: Polyphontid (based on Agrius and Oreius), Scylla (multi-headed sea monster, essentially a naval version of the Greek Hydra) Saturn Available to: Vesta, Mars Phase: Empire Myth Units: Python (giant snake) Carmenta Available to: Quirinus, Mars Phase: Town Myth Units: Teumessian Fox (teleporting fox) Indiges (deified Aeneas) Available to: Quirinus Phase: Legend Myth Units: Vrykolakas (vampire-werewolf) i dont think i ever actually made any plans for what the roman mortal units would be, but i think my intention was always to make it a composite of the republican roman and what would eventually be the imperial roman units, cross-comparing each one

ive also had some thoughts about what campaigns there could be. again using four releases as an example, ive figured that three or four campaigns could be good to each pack. in the first pack, there could be a learning campaign where you play as the hellenes and reenact the rise of syracuse, a roman campaign focusing on caesar, a carthaginian campaign with hannibal, and a persian campaign with cyrus the great. for the second pack, depending on what civs are included, there could be an atilla and belisarius campaign. going on the assumption that there'd be an indian civ in a hypothetical 3rd or 4th pack, that could open the door for an alexander campaign (unless a campaign for him could be included earlier without including his exploits in india). i also think that, in whatever would be the last official major release, there should be a "campaign" like Battle of the Conquerors in the AOK expansion, in which each civ (or whichever ones didn't get their own campaign in previous expansions) gets a single scenario focusing on an exceptionally famous or important battle in history; for example, one could have you playing as the hellenic poleis controlling the forces of both leonidas and themistocles (or just one of them) at thermopylae and/or salamis against the persians. this could also be where civs like china, india, and iberia come into major single-player gameplay. there could probably also be a japanese campaign focusing on their wars against the koreans (kaguryo, iirc) and this is just something i would personally appreciate: another Battle of the Conquerors-style game, but this one focusing on important historical battles which could have drastically affected history had they ended differently; again, thermopylae comes to mind, but playing as the persians instead, and also boudicca's rebellion against the romans

and Ides of March is less known?

but there WERE jews, and jerusalem DID exist at the time AND was known to many ancient peoples, including the romans and the persians, who had each come to control it at the respective heights of their power though Jericho is another good choice. i say Jericho only if a working wall system is implemented; otherwise, Jerusalem (or Janus or Jupiter if the design team doesn't like Jerusalem; "Janus" would probably work best if there was a focus on buildings since he was the god of doorways and gates)

i take back my earlier suggestions--both the humorous and serious ones--and would like to endorse the use of "Jerusalem" instead though i still think there should be an editor-only Jesus hero unit

been thinking about it lately, and i thought i'd repost some ideas ive had for what civs in later expansions could be 0 A.D. Part II ("Roman world" from 1-500 AD) a Germanic civilization: either generic Germanics, Vandals, Saxons, Goths, or Franks, or perhaps some encompassing Germanic people which diverges into two or more different types of Germanic peoples (for example, the Saxons and Franks) an Iranian civilization: either the Sarmatians, Parthians, or Sassanids, or perhaps some encompassing Persian/Iranian people which diverges into the Parthians and Sassanids a Western Roman civilization, either Late Rome or Imperial Rome; personally, and based on previous comments, i suggest making it the Imperial Romans of Trajan's era an Eastern Roman civilization, namely the Eastern Romans of the Early Byzantine period (from 395 to 500 AD) Huns some other civilization, possible the Dacians or Himyar (pre-Islamic) Arabs next is what i think would be a good expansion after the "official" second release: civs which didn't have much contact with the roman world (or just complementary civs), if any, divided into two packs like the first two ones an Indian civilization, presumably the Maurya, Nanda, or Sunga (possibly diverging); the Indians would be a good choice since many ancient cultures knew of/interacted with them even if there was little large-scale contact--Alexander's attempted conquest comes to mind an Egyptian civilization, perhaps best if dated from the 28th to 30th dynasties (between the two periods of Achaemind rule) or alternatively the Ptolemaic kingdom a Mediterranean civilization, such as the Etruscans a Near Eastern civilization, such as the Neo-Babylonian Empire unknown unknown and then from 1-500 AD a Chinese civilization, presumably the Qin and/or Han dynasties and possibly diverging into the Three Kingdoms Yamato Japanese (from the Jomon to Yayoi periods; notably, this would have to exclude samurai in normal gameplay since that noble class didnt exist at the time) a Korean civilization, namely the Kaguryo Classical Mayans an African civilization, presumably the Axumites but possibly the Meroe/Kushites unknown for an even 30 civs, there could possibly be some "filler" civilizations from the entire period (both BC and AD), especially if theyre "tribal" peoples Israelites unknown unknown unknown unknown unknown finally, just as a note, some civs that would be interesting are actually out of the (original) scope of 0 AD in terms of chronology: Mongols: the Mongols only reached their height hundreds of years after the cut-off date, and the Mongols that DID exist during 0 AD's period were a non-entity Islamic civilizations: since Muhammad was born around 570 AD and Islam founded in the 7th century, any Islamic civs are past the cut-off dateas another note, there's a few changes that i think should be made to teh original civs in terms of aesthetics the Romans in Part 1 should be called Republican Romans (if they aren't already) to differentiate them from later Roman civs the Poleis could perhaps be renamed "Peloponnesians" to go along with the naming conventions of other civs the Persians of Part 1 should be called Achaemenid Perians or just Achaemenids, unless no other Persian civs that use the name "Persia(n)" are included later

while we're on the subject, i noticed that the earthen fortifications that the celts have their (for want of a better word) ramps that run right down to the ground. will units be able to stand on those? cuz this has more justification than (for example) climbing a ladder or rope or what have you personally, ive thought that the best way to make units stand on walls would be to have walls capable of garrisoning units, perhaps according to how long the wall is (i noticed in the editor that there's short, medium, and long walls). for example, a short wall could perhaps hold only one unit, a medium wall two, and a long wall three. technically, this would be unrealistic since, logically speaking, at least a dozen troops could fit on a single segment of wall, but it IS a video game after all when it gets to that, id also personally recommend that units that are on walls can be hurt by attacking the wall with ranged units, receiving what is essentially splash damage, and that (appropriately), units that are standing on a wall should die instantly when the wall is destroyed. there could maybe even be a flailing animation for when they fall also, sort of related, there should be a wilhelm scream somewhere in the game as a sound effect, just for the humor factor maybe it could go to hero #3 for each civ (if that hero is male)

i say, for the humor factor, that we should call it Jesus and include an editor-only hero unit of Jesus (no attack, but huge morale boosts and healing powers) if we want to be more serious, though, then i say either Jupiter/Jove or Janus

oh, he DEFINITELY works, then! one thing i still want to figure out, though, is which of the roman major gods will get what heroes. one thing i decided on is that, in general, heroic civs should have more varied sets of heroes (the greeks get a different set for each major god while the hittites will get a different hero depending on what gods they worship). any ideas for what could work best for the romans?

ill have to look more into him, then. which agricola did you mean, though? cuz im not very well informed on ancient roman historical figures '

agrippa sounds like he'd be a good choice if the romans are a heroic civ, but belisarius wouldn't work since these are supposed to be pagan romans

i finally got a myth unit for Mixcoatl! i call it the Tlacotleyoalli, but its technically an invented myth unit. the name is (roughly) nahuatl for "night lord", and is based on the Lords of the Night from mesoamerican calendars, nine deities who ruled a particular night, cycling every nine nights. there will probably be reference to the Black Sun of mesoamerican myth as well based on conversations elsewhere on the board, ive been considering most closely basing Godstorm's romans on the hypothetical imperial romans that would be included in part 2 of 0ad itself, and thus make them of Trajan's era. this would probably work best since it would also provide justification for them having deified emperors (caesar, augustus, aeneas, and romulus are who i decided on, iirc) as well as present them at their greatest extent and strength this makes me wonder, though, what should their hero types be? i had originally planned to make them a "heroic" civilization since they have alot of historical characters that i could use (remember, "heroic" civs would receive named characters as opposed to generic heroes like the norse jarl or "rulers" like the egyptian pharaoh). i suppose i still could, though, but just give them different figures like military commanders (scipio comes to mind), as well as whether or not i should include those who would later become the byzantines.