Hmm, updates?

[ZeZar]

I just checked the 0ad website, and saw this::

"Announcement: Staff of the Month: March"

March i thought?? Are we still in March?? I checked some, and found it, MAN, its like 2nd MAY !!

So, hmm, you see what i mean right??

[Wijitmaker]

You need to talk to your newsies, Sting and Code Optimist.

Looks like they have been slacking

Send them a PM and ask them to post more news

[Tonto_Icy_Tripod]

Time to start cracking that whip again

[CodeOptimist]

Whoops, gotta post a bit more news... (although I thought Wijit always did the Staff of the Month posts, not Sting or I)

[TrashA]

I always thought there were 12 civs. Now I look and see 6. I think you should post news on an every other day schedual. That way the staff will get encuragment and the fans will know whats going on.

[Acumen]

We opted to divide our efforts into multiple development cycles so that we don't bite off more than we can chew. Plus, balancing twelve civs at once would have been an overwhelming undertaking.

The game is released sooner, we gain feedback on what's most desired for future addons, and we can do a much better job on the extra civilisations from the experience we've gained with the first release. So everybody wins.

The first edition will cover 6 civilisations who were at their peak in the period 500 BC to 1 AD. The expansion pack will add the remaining civilisations for 1 AD to 500 AD.

When the design was streamlined, some proposed civs were also merged because they shared a common base (for example, the Britons and Gauls now branch off from the Celts).

[TrashA]

dont get me wrong. I dont really mind a small number of civs. I just like them ballanced and not puting one over another in stranth. But for the news, the more news, the more people have to talk about, the more posts on the forum, and the more feedback you get. And it would encurage the developers to make more. I looked at the news everyday in the past. Now i look at them every week on saterday. I dont really expect news that much anymore. But it would be nice to have stuff to look at and read.

[ZeZar]

Listen mate, 6 civs arent small. Its quite big actually. Think about EE. There you had 4? civs in that age. Also Empires have 4 civs in that age. 6 isnt that small. And 12 is really big !

[Curufinwe]

(

Well, AoM is small too ... 3 + 1 with TT .... 6 is enormously big

[Acumen]

Right, it all comes down to the degree of uniqueness between the civs. Way back in the mists of time when 0 A.D. started as an AoK mod, then segued over to a full game, the design was still in the mindset of being very much like the mechanics of AoK.

Hence, 12 civs was perfectly plausible, because those twelve would be virtually identical (just a few variations in available techs, a couple of unique bonuses, and a Unique Unit to tell them apart).

The other end of the spectrum is something like Starcraft, AoM, C&C. 2-3 races that are extremely different (in their resource gathering methods, totally unique sets of units and techs, totally different tactics).

We're going for something inbetween those two extremes. Why not make them completely unique? Well, we're constrained by history; the fundamentals of ancient warfare were quite similar from one civilisation to another (compared to the totally alien races of Starcraft).

You had your basic building blocks of swordsmen, spearmen, javelinists, archers, support, cavalry, siege, navy, etc, but there was also a lot of variation in culture, fashion, architecture, politics, organisation, available technology, local resources (materials), trade, tactics, available militia, local wildlife, terrain and so on, that influenced the personality of that civilisation.

And, as pointed out, balancing is very important to us, and balancing civs with a common base is much easier.

Also, there would have been mutiny if we completely cut any civs.

And that's why we need to address no more than six civs at the same time. Trying to do all twelve at all at once with that degree of variation would kill us.