Just Wondering

[ralphierocks]

Hey community,

I have taken about 6 months off from this game/forum. I played a good 4 hours of it last year and figured I would give the dev's time to work on it and bring a more playable version to the front. I looked back over the last two releases and I am wondering something;

See I build websites and small business applications for a living and I run into customers from time to time that ask for features to be implemented into their site or software before it's logically relevant. When I play this game now, I still see the same issues with AI that I saw before, there are some great improvements, don't get me wrong, but the basics aren't even polished out yet. What I do see however is more civ's added to the game and that raises the question, would the limited time you guys have be better spent on adding content or making the game more playable?

Don't get me wrong, I enjoy this game a lot, it's just not something I can play more than once or twice before hanging it up again to play a more complete game. The path finding is still an issue, AI is still...yeah, basic features are still lacking, etc. I would just prefer to see those things fixed before adding Egypt in as a civ or the like. Either way I will play the game, the only question is will I be playing the next update or waiting a few years for the completed game.

One other question, idea, suggestion, thought:

In an effort to not make another AoE clone, unit formation's are a step in the right direction, but that won't change "much" of the gameplay/strategy mechanics. Like AoE, this is a numbers game, who can throw the most troops the fastest at the other guy. Sure some troops are stronger than others, but sending an army of villagers could wipe out a small legion of men. I read in the forum about adding modifiers for terrain height when it comes to archers and I have to say, that is exactly what I was thinking. Another thought would be terrain height modifiers for general troops, swinging my sword down at the enemy is going to do more damage than swinging my sword up at the enemy. Another consideration would be dense forest modifiers, cav slows dramatically, archer accuracy lowers dramatically, and maybe civs historically known to have waged combat in dense forestry get a bonus.

I know the above is asking a lot but lobbing my troops at the enemies troops repeatedly until the AI "submits" feels like AoE all over again. There was no real strategy minus the basics of either walling up or rushing out when it came to AoE, they added the Wonders and then they added Posts you could take over to give the game a more strategic feel, but intelligent players still realized at the end of the day it came down to who could click their mouse faster tasking people to gather resources and build more troops (any unit will do) than the other guy. Common sense would dictate that if you rush your cav into spearmen in a phalanx, bad things are going to happen. Slight modifiers for that mistake won't cut it, a "strategy" would be to occupy the front of the phalanx while the cav flanked their exposed sides or back. Who knows, at this point I may be growing too old for this point and click style of an RTS and have too much appreciation for Rome: Total War which seemed to nail combat more STRATEGICALLY and realistically.

As it stands now, if they ever made an AoE IV game, what would become of 0AD? I would just like to see some clear distinction between 0AD and AoE...these are just my own personal opinions and thoughts.

Anyway, I know you can't please everyone at once, so I can only ask to take those things into consideration, I was just hoping for more of a game after taking a break for 6 months.

Thanks for your time and committment to the RTS genre.

Edit: By Age of Empires III they added Cards and Home City Shipments, which did provide an element of strategy, by creating decks you could counter rushers or turtlers alike. Plus the French Factories that could generate resources were an all too valuable building and destroying the enemies Factories was a real game changer. But, combat was still the same point, click, hope to have more men than the opponent, no strategy, meet in the middle and fight it out redundancy.

Edited June 13, 2013 by ralphierocks

[sanderd17]

See I build websites and small business applications for a living and I run into customers from time to time that ask for features to be implemented into their site or software before it's logically relevant. When I play this game now, I still see the same issues with AI that I saw before, there are some great improvements, don't get me wrong, but the basics aren't even polished out yet. What I do see however is more civ's added to the game and that raises the question, would the limited time you guys have be better spent on adding content or making the game more playable?

Content creation happens mostly by the artists. While improving the game (reducing the lag etc) is done by programmers. There are only a few people here that do both. Most are specialised in one or the other. So having more content doesn't take time from improving it technically.

In an effort to not make another AoE clone, unit formation's are a step in the right direction, but that won't change "much" of the gameplay/strategy mechanics. Like AoE, this is a numbers game, who can throw the most troops the fastest at the other guy. Sure some troops are stronger than others, but sending an army of villagers could wipe out a small legion of men. I read in the forum about adding modifiers for terrain height when it comes to archers and I have to say, that is exactly what I was thinking. Another thought would be terrain height modifiers for general troops, swinging my sword down at the enemy is going to do more damage than swinging my sword up at the enemy. Another consideration would be dense forest modifiers, cav slows dramatically, archer accuracy lowers dramatically, and maybe civs historically known to have waged combat in dense forestry get a bonus.

Unit formations don't work now. Period. But they're related to the pathfinder. And a new pathfinder should be coming soon. Once that pathfinder is a bit optimized, we can think again about formations. Some formations should give a speed bonus, others get a combat bonus. A formation could also be bonused against another formation, and some sides of the formation can be weaker. But as I said, this can only be done when the new pathfinder is in.

The swing of the sword is just an animation (and not something we want to focus on, you don't want to control how a single unit swings its sword). So that won't change.

But when the new pathfinder is in (again), routes through forests could be made slower for some civilisations than for others.

There have also been discussions about vision range based on obstructions or terrain elevation.

So yes, we're working on it. And if you can help, you're always welcome.

Edited June 13, 2013 by sanderd17

[Enrique]

Hello ralphierocks,

To address your first concern, adding new civilizations is an art related task (3D buildings, textures, units, props, etc) which takes zero time away from developers to work on gameplay features and fixes. In the same way, a 3D artist cannot help on adding those gameplay features other than suggesting, throwing ideas and such. So there's no time spent on adding new civs that could be invested in new features.

Regarding the AI and pathfinder: AI's have been greatly improved from last alpha, and there's ground work for improvement in that area (there's already basic support for naval AI movement IIRC). Other features like formations and their bonuses (which they're planned) are related with pathfinder. Pathfinder is being worked and we're aware that it has slowed down other features developement, not only formations, charging/running is another example. These features will diferentiate more 0AD from Aoe if that's your big concern. Just keep in mind there are more features that you may not be aware of that are planned (like building capturing) that will enhace the strategic gameplay of the title.

We hope to keep adding these features and more and make 0AD unique. But as you already know, free time to contribute on the project is not always available. And contributors sometimes stop contributing for work reasons, or personal reasons so key features like pathfinding development is being slow.

I hope you enjoy the final product even if you have to wait a little longer to play it in it's full glory

[ralphierocks]

Hello ralphierocks,

To address your first concern, adding new civilizations is an art related task (3D buildings, textures, units, props, etc) which takes zero time away from developers to work on gameplay features and fixes. In the same way, a 3D artist cannot help on adding those gameplay features other than suggesting, throwing ideas and such. So there's no time spent on adding new civs that could be invested in new features.

Regarding the AI and pathfinder: AI's have been greatly improved from last alpha, and there's ground work for improvement in that area (there's already basic support for naval AI movement IIRC). Other features like formations and their bonuses (which they're planned) are related with pathfinder. Pathfinder is being worked and we're aware that it has slowed down other features developement, not only formations, charging/running is another example. These features will diferentiate more 0AD from Aoe if that's your big concern. Just keep in mind there are more features that you may not be aware of that are planned (like building capturing) that will enhace the strategic gameplay of the title.

We hope to keep adding these features and more and make 0AD unique. But as you already know, free time to contribute on the project is not always available. And contributors are sometimes stop contributing for work reasons, or personal reasons so key features like pathfinding development is being slow.

I hope you enjoy the final product even if you have to wait a little longer to play it in it's full glory

I have shown my ignorance then, I assumed coding in the extra civ's was taking away from the dev of the game. Building capturing would be a plus in my book as well as the other person mentioning something as simple as slowing down units in dense forestry or heck even slowing down units not suited/used to fighting in desert terrain would be a plus. Little features like that go a long way in distinguishing 0AD from the stock RTS games we are used to seeing. I took the 6 months off and came back, I don't mind coming back again in a few months to see how things have progressed. I'm happy someone picked up the torch where AoE left off and I look forward to further developments.

Thanks for taking the time to reply.

[Lion.Kanzen]

I think we are the evolution of a brilliant gameplay, if you take the time to see planned features and coming for next alpha can bring a lovely surprise. The optimization is something the team, take seriously and the team are split in programmers and artist. And all can contribute with something. Searching things in Internet, like, historic articles, found art about units in game, propose to add new ideas and features about gameplay. you can say other people about the Project. And Welcome to the Forums.