About The Population Limit

[frapell]

I'm just wondering, since the population limit has been set to 200... is this going to be modifiable from some configure screen or something ?

it's very frustrating to have a population limit, and it was something that i HATED from the AoE series...

i understand that inreasing this number has some performance implications, but i would REALLY like to be able to modify this number if i want to, and if i know my hardware will be able to keep up...

[Mythos_Ruler]

The current limit is temporary until we can do true performance testing. Likely it will go up to 300 or so, but we just don't know yet. We also plan to allow the game host to choose the pop limit when hosting a game.

[Pureon]

It's easy to edit the 'maxPop' value in the Player.js file using notepad.

[chaosislife]

It's easy to edit the 'maxPop' value in the Player.js file using notepad.

off to test what a setting of -666 does. Bwahahaha.

[Sebovzeoueb]

I would be in favour of the game supporting at least 500 units. But 300 is already better than 200, for sure.

I agree with frapell on this one, the population limit in AoE is really annoying. Some might say that this increases the strategy element of the game, but I just like to build massive armies and watch the ensuing carnage. From my testing of Alpha 5 (I can't run the SVN version due to being on OS X) I would say the 500 is a pretty good amount of population, but it is very laggy.

On a side note, I've always wanted someone to make a RTS game with old-school 2D graphics, with the system requirements of say AoE 1, but then to make it have a massive population limit (maybe even thousands). Surely this would run smoothly on the shiny machines we have today? Total Annihilation has a 5000 pop limit patch, but the pathfinding is already pretty shoddy with small numbers of units. I have never really seen the point in RTS games being 3D, other than to keep up with the other games. AoK already has more than good enough graphics to see what is going on... But yeah, I'm going now. I'll stop.

[chaosislife]

I would be in favour of the game supporting at least 500 units. But 300 is already better than 200, for sure.

I agree with frapell on this one, the population limit in AoE is really annoying. Some might say that this increases the strategy element of the game, but I just like to build massive armies and watch the ensuing carnage. From my testing of Alpha 5 (I can't run the SVN version due to being on OS X) I would say the 500 is a pretty good amount of population, but it is very laggy.

On a side note, I've always wanted someone to make a RTS game with old-school 2D graphics, with the system requirements of say AoE 1, but then to make it have a massive population limit (maybe even thousands). Surely this would run smoothly on the shiny machines we have today? Total Annihilation has a 5000 pop limit patch, but the pathfinding is already pretty shoddy with small numbers of units. I have never really seen the point in RTS games being 3D, other than to keep up with the other games. AoK already has more than good enough graphics to see what is going on... But yeah, I'm going now. I'll stop.

I think part of it will be in how many units you actually have in the field as opposed to garrisoned units for defense. As it is right now, I could see myself running into a situation where I can't raise an army of worthwhile force without leaving all of my defenses empty, which would be a problem with human players since I'm going to assume from the start that they'd use similar tactics to me........and have an army waiting to attack my base while I'm attacking theirs. Other problems come when you factor in the actual population cost of some units, if you use alot of cavalry the pop limit might as well be 100. If I use the still in the works helepolis it actually costs I think 3 for the unit and then 15 at least to fully arm it bringing it up to 18 total cost per helepolis. And it's not wise to just send one right now, they wind up spending alot of time running away from that one melee fighter that survived to stab the side of it. Personally I favor the only limitation on population being on how many houses you can build per civ center.

[gudo]

...Personally I favor the only limitation on population being on how many houses you can build per civ center.

Hmmm... You know, I don't think this is such a good idea. Territories are already going to grant a huge bonus for owning them (chiefly, you can build buildings there) making resourcing and military operations much easier. Allowing your max population to rise directly proportional to the number of territories you have is overkill.

Suppose you're playing a 1v1 with 4 territories. Both you and your opponent get two of them, then you manage to take one of theirs. Now you have three territories, and they only have one. That means that your max population is three times larger, in addition to the other advantages you now hold. Not only can you now raise an army three times larger than they can, but you can also replace units faster. There's simply no way your opponent could win with odds 3:1 in your favor.

A much better solution is just to put limits on the number of population increasing buildings. Say:

10 houses max (across all territories)

1 civ center/territory max

1 fortress/territory max

This way, when you get a new territory, you wouldn't be able to say, double your max pop, but you could build another civ center and fortress and raise it by 20 (or however much they give.) In the above scenario, your opponent would never have to face 3:1 odds, but you still get a population advantage (in addition to resourcing, etc.)

[modderman]

On a side note, I've always wanted someone to make a RTS game with old-school 2D graphics, with the system requirements of say AoE 1, but then to make it have a massive population limit (maybe even thousands). Surely this would run smoothly on the shiny machines we have today? Total Annihilation has a 5000 pop limit patch, but the pathfinding is already pretty shoddy with small numbers of units. I have never really seen the point in RTS games being 3D, other than to keep up with the other games. AoK already has more than good enough graphics to see what is going on... But yeah, I'm going now. I'll stop.

Haven't you played Cossacks or American Conquest? You can have 16,000 units on a map at once.