ATLAS

[oshron]

this isnt an idea for a mod, per se, but ive decided to bring this here because i imagine you guys will be able to help me out with written designs for an RTS that im making(however, after 0AD and TLA, im hoping WF will pick it up as their next game). im calling it ATLAS at the moment. its kind of like Empire Earth in the sense that it spans a long period of time and technological advancement, ranging from the Enlightenment to the near future. it also allows for some fictionalization with alternate-history cultures

as cultures, i have down:

-- Amerindians

-- Austria

-- Aztecs

-- China

-- Confederate States

-- France

-- Germany

-- Great Britain

-- Greece

-- Gulf Nations (a collective for Arab nations on the Persian Gulf, such as Iraq and Saudi Arabia)

-- Iberia (a combination of Spain and Portugal)

-- Inca

-- India

-- Israel

-- Italy

-- Japan

-- Korea

-- Netherlands

-- Persia

-- Russia

-- Scandinavia

-- Soviet Union

-- Third Reich

-- Turkey

-- United States

-- Vietnam

-- Malaysia

-- Africa

-- Balkans

-- (i need one more civilization!)

for ages, called Eras for the most part in the game, i have them set out as:

Enlightened Era (prior to 1750 - 1803)

Napoleonic Era (1803 - 1815)

Revolutionary Era (1815 - 1860)

Victorian Era: Gilded Age (1860 - 1880)

Victorian Era: Industrial Age (1880 - 1890)

Victorian Era: Imperial Age (1890 - 1914)

World War I Era (1914 - 1918)

Interwar Era (1918 - 1939)

World Ware II Era (1939 - 1945)

Cold War Era: Ballistic Age (1945 - 1962)

Cold War Era: Atomic Age (1962 - 1990)

Computer Age (1990 - 2015)

Digital Age (2015 - 2030)

Mechanized Age (2030 - 2050)

Khrusionitic Age (2050 onwards)

as resources, i have them as several blanket groups with various means of gathering each one(usually)

FOOD

---agriculture: your basic farming, in which you just build a farm and task a citizen to it

---aquaculture: the same thing as regular farming, but you can only build it on water and it has a slightly higher yield-rate

---cloning*: after building a Genetics Facility, you can deposit meat from an animal here and then you can clone that animal at the cost of gold and energy for an unlimited supply of food

---fishing: probably one of the more efficient methods of gathering food, fish are only one of three methods of harvesting food from the sea

---foraging: your standard foraging, you task a citizen on a berry bush or a patch of fruit and theyll gather food from it

---hunting: standard hunting, same as in any other game

---hydroponics*: after building a Hydroponics Facility, you continually generate food, but at a very slow rate

---livestock: the same livestock method as any other game

---plankton farming*: once all the fish are gone, youll be forced to harvest plankton for food. you can gather from them infinitely, but they have a very low yield rate

---whaling: as controversial as it is, whaling is another form of fishing. whales are harder to come by but grant much more food than regular fish.

GOLD

there are only two methods of gathering gold, both of which are very standard: mining or trade

IRON, KHRUSIONITE, URANIUM

all three of these have only one gather method: mining

OIL/ENERGY

---geothermal*: if you can find a geyser or some other evidence of geothermal activity, you can build a Geothermal Plant on top of it to continually harvest energy from it, but at a rather slow rate

---hydroelectricity*: similar to geothermal, but much easier to exploit, by building a Hydroelectric Plant on the water's edge, you will generate energy indefinitely

---wind farming*: by building windmills and oceanic windmills, youll cocntinually gather energy. oceanic windmills gather faster, but are more expensive, can only be built from the digital age onwarrds, and can only be built on water

---oil drilling: you can gather oil by building an oil derrick(for land-based oil deposits) or an oil rig(for oceaniuc drilling). oil, however, is expendable, so youll eventually be forced to invest in alternative energy

---solar energy: by building solar panels, you can continually gather energy from the sun

STONE

i would have listed stone with the other minerals before, but stone has one more gather method. after you destroy a building, forcibly razing one of your own or from destroying enemy buildings, you can salvage the stone from the building. it has a very low yield amount, only thirty percent of that building's cost, but it gives you some incentive to attack your enemy. stone mines have a very high yield amount, though(1,000,000!!)

WOOD

wood also has only one means of harvesting. the primary is by chopping down trees, of course, but at the genetics facility, you can research Carbon Generation to constantly receive a steady trickle of wood

the * that i marked some earlier are the end-scenario resources, the ones that youll be FORCED to invest in and exploit very late in the game after you exhaust all other resources. thats based on environmental problems today and the constant threat of mass extinction of earth's life forms.

im rather sleepy right now, so that's all ill post for now

[MrChocolateBear]

oshron, I admire your ambition, but your idea seems very unrealistic, based off what you've posted so far. Creating assets for 30 factions and 15 ages is a tremendous amount of work, not to mention balancing the gameplay. What are your plans to make this project more feasible? Your project seems to be about 5 times the scale of 0 A.D., based solely on the number of factions and ages you plan on having, so I think it is really important that you consider how you can shorted the development time required to pull this project off.

I'm not saying this is a bad idea, just that the scale seems tremendous. I think that with a few scope adjustments, you could have a much more feasible game.

At any rate, I'm looking forward to reading more about your game idea.

Edited August 5, 2009 by MrChocolateBear

[oshron]

tbh, im just making this for fun. if it WAS picked up by WFG, then that would be great, but im honestly not expectong it to be

also, the different factions will, for the most part, be all the same. they get the same buildings and units and whatever, like that. what defines them are Cultural Traits, both pros and cons (for example: French walls and towers have more health and armor, but its also harder for them to hold a territory), Cultural Powers (ex: the Confederate power is Camouflage, so when their foot soldiers are idle, they become invisible), Wonders(5 for each one with different powers), Technologies(similar to wonders in effect and setup but to a far lesser extent), and, my favorite aspect, Unique Units.

there WERE unique units in AOK, but there was only one for each culture. thats all fine and good, but i decided to extend it to 8 UUs per culture, and its actually based on 50 year intervals in actual history and plausible future, as well as one additional unit in a different age for each culture. the setup for them is like this:

#1 Enlightened Era

#2 Enlightened Era - Revolutionary Era

#3 Revolutionary Era - Victorian Era: Imperial Age

#4 Victorian Era: Imperial Age - Cold War Era: Ballistic Age

#5 Cold War Era: Ballistic Age - Computer Age

#6 Computer Age - Khrusionitic Age

#7 Khrusionitic Age

#8 reserved for any unit for any age

ill give you an example of a UU setup, as i have it for the Third Reich faction:

unfortunately, #1 and #2 have yet to be filled

#3 Zeppelin (available in Imperial Age) - falls into the statistic category of light helicopter, this is unique even for a unique unit because its THE first available military air unit, putting the Germans and Nazis(remember, theres two german factions) at the advantage. hoever, like in real life, Zeppelins are no match for legit planes but are very effective as bombers and have the additional effect of dealing massive area damage to enemy buildings once destroyed, in reference to the fateful Hindenburg

#4 Battleship Bismarck (available in WWII) - the largest and most powerful ship available at this point in the game, the Bismarck is a superheavy ship dealing massive damage to lighter ship, but it is tragically vulnerable to other heavy ships, which are also available in that time period, in reference to the real Bismarck's destruction in the Channel

#5 V-4 Rocket (available in Ballistic Age) - this is actually in reference both to german research into ballistic missiles as well as to Robert Harris' novel Fatherland. in Fatherland, it is detailed in the alternative history that, after the US hit Japan with an A-bomb in 1946, Hitler launched a V-3 missile to explode over new york, effectively bringing the war to an end as he proved that germany was capable of counterattacking the US(yeah, in Fatherland, the nazis won). since the rocket here is from a later time period, its upgraded from V-3 to V-4. in addition to the standard ballistic missile, the nazis also get this one.

#6 Supersoldier (available in the Digital Age) - supersoldiers are actually a shared UU, available to the nazis, confederates, americans, AND aztecs(the last one in vague reference to jurassic park). since the nazis held a strong belief of superiority over all others, it seems fitting that they should have a supersoldier unit as well

#7 Königsmord Bomber (available in Khrusionitic Age) - this is THE strongest bomber plane in the game. period. successfully dropping this bomb ENSURES the destruction of a city and a massive death toll. it even affects air and allied units, and can be felt by buildings MILES from the blast site.

now, for the #8 unit. as i said, these are different for each faction and available in different eras. this is basically for "what's missing?," like if i already have the rest filled in or one for that slot, this one is used instead. since ive already got the bismarck for the WWII era, this is the best place to put a unique nazi foot soldier:

#8 Gestapo Officer (available in Interwar Era) - the Gestapo were the secret police of Nazi germany. though never officially their uniform, in ATLAS they wear the easily distinguished black trenchcoats often associated with the gestapo. they habe the ability to "Go Incognito" and disguise themselves as a citizen, allowing them to simply walk into an enemy territory, get close to a target, and then suddenly reveal themselves, whipping machine guns out from under their coats and blowing away the enemy.

...i think i lost my train of thought

[buggy123]

Right now I'm picturing Aztec body paint warriors dropping bombs in world war two on confederate soldiers. lol

First of all choose a time period. Take into consideration how the development of technology in the last 200 years are more than the development of technology in the entire human history.

When designing a game, your goal is to design a game that's fun to play, not fun to design. Also, this is unrealistic. Both in terms of content and development. I suggest you:

1. Divide time periods and make games focused on one period at a time.

2. Half the nations...at least.

3. Make it less complicated

We want a game that's simple to understand and fun to play, yet giving us complex options allowing the execution of beautiful tactics.

[oshron]

as i said, this allows for a good amount of fictionalization. it also covers a much smaller period of time than Empire Earth, the Age of Empires games, and even 0AD: just 300 years of human history

[MrChocolateBear]

My concern isn't with the timeline the game encompass, it is with the amount of work required to successfully pull off your vision. As I said before, your game, in terms of number of civilizations and ages, is 5 times as large as 0 A.D.. Unless you have some way of reducing the amount of work hours required to pull this game off, your vision seems very unrealistic to me.

I would be more than happy to give you ideas on how you can decrease the scope of your project, if you're interested.

Edited August 6, 2009 by MrChocolateBear

[oshron]

well, what factions do you think should be dropped? i want to end up with an even number

EDIT: or maybe i should focus more on a fantasy crossover RTS, which would have ONLY three factions

Edited August 6, 2009 by oshron

[buggy123]

how bout this, make them into 4 civilizations: Asia, Europe, Africa, North America/South America. Then as you advance through ages you can pick a sub-faction. For example, If you choose North America/South America, you get choice of Amerindians, America then as you advanced into the Revolutionary Era you get to choose Confederate states as a faction. But as you advance further, you have to choose America again.

Of course you'll have to make the factions so they are different every age, which again, is a lot of work. Though not as much (since you making them sub-factions)

[oshron]

you mean like a system of choice like there is in AOE3 and AOM?

thats actually not a bad idea. it could also allow for fictionalization and variety. thats actually kind of what i had in mind to begin with, like in the Interwar Era the blanket faction of Germany could choose to either go to Capitalist or Fascist, and then in the Ballistic Age they would choose to either go Capitalist again or remain Fascist

but, going on my current setup, what countries do you think are not necessary

[buggy123]

Umm I'm no expert of the history of this time. But some glaringly obvious ones are the Aztec/Inca.

[oshron]

again, im looking for fictionalization and alternative history as well. that means i plan to keep the aztecs, but the incas may go. as for other ones, im mainly referring to what ones could be dropped or combined into a collective, if that

[fzerorubigd]

Gulf Nations (a collective for Arab nations on the Persian Gulf, such as Iraq and Saudi Arabia)

I don't want to mess with any one but its Persian Gulf not Arabian Gulf Why noyt Arab Nations instead of Gulf Nations!!

Sorry if this post look like spam

[Brightgalrs]

A Civ RTS would be very cool.

[Jeru]

It's sort of interesting that you'll lump different Arab nations together, the Scandinavians and the Balkan peoples, who are very different and sometimes hate eachother, but yet you separate Nazi Germany, Germany in other historical eras and Austria into different civs.

I think you can do with fewer civs, fewer eras and simpler gameplay

Edited August 18, 2009 by Jeru