oshron

i agree. it's good to know that your command went through, and it's a basic feature of just about every computer as well. that's why we get pop-up menus when we right-click. not only that, but every RTS i've ever played (and alot of other games, too) also have some kind of visual indicator

iirc, we had figured that buildable Wonders would all have the same three effects (for balance purposes) and that editor-only versions of all the Wonders (and some additional ones, like the Colossus) would have unique effects more closely associated with what the Wonders stood for (like the Hanging Gardens giving you a farming bonus). the skirmish-mode wonder effects were figured as Imperialism, Hegemony, and Alliance, which affect the territorial influence of yourself, your enemies, or your allies (Hegemony negatively affects them)Mythos_Ruler came up with this, not me, just to be clear

i'm pretty the gorilla is included for use in some non-historical maps which are set in Sub-Saharan Africa (though they kinda do have historical justification because the Carthaginians circumnavigated Africa, and iirc our first accounts of gorillas actually come from the Carthaginians). i seem to recall reading that a "Cameroon" map is or was planned which is basically 0ad's version of the Black Forest map from AOK. to give a bit of context, there is (or was) another map set at the North Pole, hence the inclusion of polar bears and walruses on the animal listing even though no one lived anywhere near the North Pole except for the Inuit and the predecessors of teh Vikings (both of which fall out of 0ad's timeframe and geographic range). in short, it would just be a map included for fun and have no bearing on the historicity of the civs themselves.i agree that some Sub-Saharan minifactions would be interesting, the challenge being that we find civs which are distinct enough to justify their inclusion in general, i think that minifactions should still be at least relatively associated with the playable civs and have the possibility of having been encountered by at least one of them, while also taking into consideration that some of these "minor civs" could have enough going for them that they could be full playable factions later on. for example, the Japanese (specifically of the Yamato period) fall into 0ad's timeframe, as does Han China and the Mayans (all three of which are among my top proposals for later civs to be included). that's why i suggest civs that are already partly included via units for a given civ (Israelites/Judaeans via the Ptolemies, Mauritanians via the Carthaginians, Babylonians via the Persians, etc.) and then considering other civs we know that the various playable factions encountered historically actually, there could conceivably be only one necessary building per minifaction, quite simply a settlement that resembles several buildings but is actually one big one, about as big on the ground as a Wonder but looking like a few huts surrounding a central building resembling a barracks or fortress, and you can capture or build a trading post/outpost near there to enable the training of mercenary units at your barracks (there could perhaps be a second row of units on top of the current one which consists only of mercenary units, perhaps several arranged by broad region of origin) you beat me to it

i seem to remember hearing that a "Herocide" game mode is or was planned

i think if any "minifactions" are going to be included, the first ones should be ones which are already presented in the game, such as all the different mercenaries that the Carthaginians get being a bit more fleshed-out with some extra units that we know they employed, but only the actual mercenaries that are part of the Carthaginian civ are trainable (e.g., if there were, say, Numidian infantry that aren't already avaiable to the Carthaginians, then they aren't trainable by other civs which may establish a trading post at a Numidian settlement)

ooh, gorillas i'm REALLY looking forward to seeing all of these critters in-game

some editor-only units for male civilians would probably be good, though, for the purposes of scenario design. like your soldiers are marching through your town on the way to war as male and female civilians (and maybe some children, too) are watching and wishing them well

helicopter-style flight could actually be relatively easy to do. basically, since the unit isn't constantly in motion like an airplane would be (using Empire Earth as an example), it could work basically by making it so that the unit is technically on the ground, but the unit's model is raised up above the ground (say, ten meters or so) and can only be attacked by ranged units as well as being ranged themselves, so they can attack ground units. they would also be able to navigate anny terrain. the latter could also actually work for low-flying units, which are close enough to the ground that they can be attacked by melee units, but also so that they can fly over impassable terrain like clifffaces and deep water

personally, i would really appreciate an "Explore" function; it would help with macromanagement, so that the player doesn't have to be constantly checking on their scouts or even give them multiple commands for where they want them to go and therefore be able to devote more time to building their economy or training an army

currently, i think what i'd be doing with the editor is recreating settings from non-RTS games that i'm a part of to help both myself and other visualize what the setting would look like (e.g., the mining town around my DnD character's estate, or the village where one of my different OCs comes from). that's one of teh things i like about 0ad's diversity of civs meantime, i'll contribute in whatever way i can

actually, i haven't fully played 0ad yet it was lagging too badly on the one computer i installed it on so far so i was actually planning on waiting until the beta phase

the Vikings fall out of 0ad's timeframe, even for the Part 2 civs from 1-500 AD. though they're very cool (Odin's Norse were one of my favorite civs to play as in AOM), they can't be added for the sake of historicity that doesn't mean Viking units and buildings can't be added as editor-only objects for Part 2 personally, i think they'd go very well as scenario-only antagonists for a playable Anglo-Saxon civ. in terms of gameplay, there could perhaps be sme in-game triggers that can be set up so that all the units for a Germanic faction are replaced with the editor-only Viking units (there was a trigger like this in AOM, which instantly transformed all units of a specific class into another specific class, e.g., all Hoplites turn into Huskarls). there's also examples in other games of normally unbuildable units which can be enabled for certain scenarios; i think Empire Earth is the best example, it had this in the first game but expanded on it in its expansion, with all sorts of Roman units that otherwise conflicted with the normal building roster: Short Swords, Phalanxes, Vikings, and Barbarians could be replaced with Gallic Warriors, Celtic Warriors, Roman Legionaries, and so on, and some others had no confliction with other units, like the Samurai, some Moorish units, and even futuristic ones like the Black Robes

i think this should ultimately be a goal of Wildfire Games, but for right now let's just focus on Antiquity, m'kay? i'd gladly talk about this at length, but this isn't the thread to do that in personally, i think it would mainly just be fitting to have an even number of official civilizations to each part of 0ad, as well as being a good basis for future civs, e.g. a Part 2 civ has an equivalent in Part 1 (Athenians to Byzantines for geography, Spartans to Huns for militancy, Persians to Sassanids for culture, Indians to Mayans for odd-man-out, etc.), as well as again giving a nice round number. my suggestion of the Syracusans is also because designing them would be relatively easy given the three other Greek factions already in-game, as well as having a unique potential Wonder (Archimedes' mirror) and making a good candidate for a Learning Campaign. though they do share geography with the Romans, i think they're more unique than the Seleucids (e.g. Greco-Persians) but i see the reasoning for each, especially considering that the Seleucids are better-known than the Syracusans (everyone's heard of Archimedes, and know that he was a Greek, but probably not nearly as many know that he was from Syracuse) again, my personal suggestion is just getting a nice round number of civilizations

one thing occurs to me, though: depending on how many civs are added in the grand scheme of things, the AOM-style selection screen may need to be simplified a bit. there's currently ten civs, potentially eleven with the Ptolemaics (and personally i think one more should be added, the Syracusans, for an rounded, even twelve). this means the best arrangement of civs would be either four columns and three rows or three columns and four rows (i think four columns would be best) now, if the Part 2 civilizations match the Part 1 civs in number, that's twenty-four civilizations and would call for some rearrangements to the selection screen, probably needing each selection icon to be sized-down to accomodate them luckily, i have an idea for this, too this time, i'll give a very basic visual example simply put, the selection screen in Part 1 is in greater resolution, ideally with each civ being organized into relevant rows (a little different in my example below) like this: Iberians - Romans - Syracusans Athenians - Macedonians - Spartans Carthaginians - Persians - Ptolemaics Britons - Gauls - Mauryans for the record, i included Syracusans for the purposes of example even though they aren't a faction (yet) and the Mauryans are lumped with the Celts because every other row is already full

glad i could help first the Hanging Gardens and now the selection screen

building on this, i think that a good way of making the selection screen would be in a similar manner to Age of Mythology (rather than Age of Kings or Empire Earth), with the civs organized into rows and columns in either squares or circles (one or the otheer) with edge stylizations, a portrait, and a map background which varies between civilizations, accompanied by the civilization's name, with a separate column along the right edge of the screen which gives some brief details on their best-known history (the Spartans get mention of Thermopylae, the Macedonians have Alexander's conquests, and the Carthaginians have Hannibal crossing the Alps). going into greater detail, the outermost edge of these selection images would be based on an iconic substance or art design to that civilization (like the edge designs on Greek pottery for the Hellenic factions), with a map of the area that civilization hails from in the background (so Balkan Peninsula for the Hellenic factions, France for the Gauls, North Africa for the Carthaginians, etc.), and a portrait of the most iconic unit of that faction, so the Macedonians get their Companion Cavalry, the Romans have a Legionary, the Spartans have a Hoplite, and so on. the unit portrait (which should probably be at least from the waist up) should ideally not obscure the map in the background. clicking on these pictures would cause them to become outlined in gold, perhaps with a sound signalling your choice (a generic rousing cry for all of them or a specific phrase for each one, along the lines of "Let's go!" or "To victory!")

tbph, for now we can probably just use stock animal sounds, at least as placeholders.

personally, i'd recommend these types of sounds (i don't have any examples presently): you could probably just physically record yourself clicking on a mouse button and amplifying the sound to make it more distinct for UI button sounds iirc, some games have had the sound of coins clinking (or something similar) for technology completion, though that may be more fitting for a market a rousing cry (kinda like what the Spartans yell in 300) would probably be good for phase advancement, perhaps even varying between civilizations if that's possible. it could perhaps be that civ's word for, "Onward!" as in "onward into the future", or an equivalent word or phrase ("Forward!" "Let's go!" "Success!" "Yes!" "Hurrah!") actually, now that i think about it, maybe it would be a good tribute to the entire cast for everyone who contributed to the final game and is available to do so to just submit a recording of themselves shouting "Hurrah!" or otherwise cheering and compiled together into a single sound effect for phase advancement across all the civs [*]similar to the above, a cheer would probably be good for when heroes are trained. if possible, there could be varying ones for each hero or for each civilization in their respective languages, or just in English. the onlye xample i can think of is "Hail Caesar!" if Julius himself is a hero (i can't remember if he is or isn't) [*]ominous chanting would probably be best for the wonders, something to evoke awe and mystery in fact, since i've mentioned it, maybe "collective" cheers and other such sounds would be good "neutral" sounds where applicable

i could try, too, but providing them to the developers might be a little tricky

i'd say a male majority among soldier classes in-game is an acceptable break from historicity. i think it would be unnecessarily complicated to add in new female versions of all the units for regular gameplay. maybe there could be female versions of some citizen-soldiers as editor-only units, but throwing them in for regular one-on-one gameplay seems like a bit much. besides, there's already some other breaks from historicity, like the Celts getting proper walls rather than earthen ramparts like they were originally planned

fair point. though the Colossus straddled the entrance to a harbor, so would such a gate even be possible gameplay wise? the idea with the two separate parts positioned together is such that it can technically be placed anywhere, over pathways OR waterways, without blocking the passage at allincidentally, an idea just occurred to me: perhaps there could also be an aesthetics-only building showing the Colossus in a ruined state, as the historical Colossus was knocked over in an earthquake less than a hundred years after it was built and its ruins were visited by the people of the time in the same way that the Parthenon is visited today. this would be useful not only for a historical context but also for designing fictional settings. imagine a group of named characters are traveling through the desert and they pass by a ruined Colossus. it has no other bearing on the story, just a sign of a long extinct civilization that used to live in the desert, teh last remaining sign that they ever existed though including a Colossus Gate would be another cool addition, again for situation use. it could perhaps be perched on a taller-and-thicker-than-normal gate. is this a current model for the game, or is it from something else? it looks like one of the earlier AOE games

that doesn't work very well for functionality, though. maybe there can be two editor-only eye candy buildings simulating two halves of the Colossus, one left side and one right side, which are to scale with the actual Colossus and can be placed on opposite sides of a pathway/waterway. in this way, the complete Colossus can still appear in the game in its original incarnation without obstructing any other units (the obstruction tiles would only be around the feet while the rest of the Colossus extends to the sides. but seriously, do you want to have your units sailing under some giant bronze guy's junk? for gameplay, it would be much easier to have the Colossus positioned more like this: see? grand, majestic, powerful. THAT'S something i'd want to build in my empire to signify the defeat of an invasion. build him right next to the shore and he looks out, taunting my enemies on the next island over. he's all like "What'cha gonna do about it, a**hole? I've got a hundred catapults guardin' this harbor! "

rescaling the historic wonders to game proportions is an acceptable break from reality personally, i think there should be a standard maximum width (in all directions, e.g., the base of a Wonder should be a perfect square rather than a rectangle or a circle) and a standard maximum height, with Wonders to scale with their historical counterparts (if that can be determined; as mentioned before, some units of measurement that were used to describe them are not only no longer used, but the dimensions of such aren't known either). so, for example, in-game the standard height of a wonder could be a 100 feet (that's 30 meters for our non-American members ) with a 50x50 ft (30x30 m) base. the Wonders would proportionately be as close to their historical counterparts as possible even if they're a little off-scale, either larger or smaller

oh, i have plenty but i'm too busy right now finals are comin' up

i'm just spitballin' here if it's already in the game or something, then i'm just @#$%ing stupid