Suggestions for 0 A.D.

[feneur]

In the wiki/trac, it says that soldiers gain experience simply by existing. I for the most part, disagree with this. Besides being unrealistic, it could in some ways become somewhat annoying since the advanced soldiers are not as good at overall resource gathering than basic soldiers. I recommend that you have units gain experience in several different ways besides fighting. One way they could gain experience without fighting is patrolling and acting as a sentinel by being garrisoned in towers and other watching points. I don't think that this kind of stuff should give a really good rate of experience, but at perhaps one experience a second. The other way that soldiers could gain experience without fighting is perhaps by standing within the aura of a barracks. While standing in that aura, perhaps they could do different things like march, do attack animations, etc,... This would be the preferred way to have soldiers gain experience without fighting I think.

Hmm, I might be missing something/information might be outdated, but the idea is for soldiers to gain experience when fighting. Could you please post a link to where it says otherwise so it can be fixed?

[Mythos_Ruler]

We could probably simplify it by just making XP accrue through fighting.

[feneur]

That's how I've always have imagined it, I might have misunderstood how it was intended though

[Mythos_Ruler]

He's right. Originally (and currently?) it's spec'd to accrue simply over time as well. But I think it would simplify things if it only accrued through fighting, instead of adding multiple layers of XP.

Another idea would be to use XP as another resource that you can use to manually upgrade your troops and research special technologies. But then that complicates things again.

[Thorfinn the Shallow Minded]

I like the idea of researching upgrades, but probably soldiers would only get an XP that upgrades their level, while heroes and super units gain experience that allows you to research specific military techs and unlock special formations.

[General Octavian]

Unit levels should unlock new armors and wep improvements along with formations. My 2 cents for now

[fcxSanya]

Hmm, I might be missing something/information might be outdated, but the idea is for soldiers to gain experience when fighting. Could you please post a link to where it says otherwise so it can be fixed?

This was stated at least here: http://trac.wildfiregames.com/wiki/XML.Entity.Traits.Promotion?version=1 in the sections "Notes:ExperientialUpgradeSystem" and "GainingExperience", and maybe in some other places too. I'm not going to implement this feature in current version of my patch for units promotion and accordingly to Michael's and Erik's opinions I removed these parts from documentation (also I removed sentence about b->a->e automatic next entity selection accordingly to Philip's notes to patch).

[ronin]

I am pretty new to 0 A.D

but needless to say I am loving it :-D

But there are few issues. .

1. characters have a tendency of getting lost in woods.They will enter the woods and get stuck there only

2. I particularly found building walls difficult,being able to rotate them is a great feature but you have to really aim it to build it the way you want to.

3. units have tendency to go around the gates and not through them.

4. can anyone guide me how to hunt animals for food??They are fast and keep running away

When we move any unit by right clicking it , there should be a sign that action has been accepted (like in AOE2,it will show something red converging when you right click on map having selected any unit)

Plus I missed scores of other players too!

As I am still in exploratory stage many of the issues may be redundant but better to ask

I read some of the suggestions in the forum and if all of them materialize , 0 A.D. is going to be the best game ever! \m/

cheers

[feneur]

1. characters have a tendency of getting lost in woods.They will enter the woods and get stuck there only

2. I particularly found building walls difficult,being able to rotate them is a great feature but you have to really aim it to build it the way you want to.

3. units have tendency to go around the gates and not through them.

4. can anyone guide me how to hunt animals for food??They are fast and keep running away

When we move any unit by right clicking it , there should be a sign that action has been accepted (like in AOE2,it will show something red converging when you right click on map having selected any unit)

Plus I missed scores of other players too!

1,4, the last couple: Just not implemented yet, but it should come eventually.

2,3: There will be a better walls/towers/gates system, something like in most games where you click to place an end-point of the wall and then click to place more end-points (and the game inserts the pieces between). Gates and towers will most likely be upgrades for the wall. Walking through gates is not implemented yet either, but will be at the same time the rest of the wall system.

[Thorfinn the Shallow Minded]

I just wanted to note something. The fiery shots of siege weapons are epic, but it would be neat if you could switch between the fiery shots and the normal kinds. The fiery ones would do a temporary morale decrease (Lower attack rate.)that affects the basic units quite a bit, the advanced units is far more negligible, the elite units and super units only have a smattering of their morale affected, and heroes are unaffected. The thing that would make the fiery shot not as effective as the normal kind is the fact that it is not very accurate.

[Mythos_Ruler]

I just wanted to note something. The fiery shots of siege weapons are epic, but it would be neat if you could switch between the fiery shots and the normal kinds. The fiery ones would do a temporary morale decrease (Lower attack rate.)that affects the basic units quite a bit, the advanced units is far more negligible, the elite units and super units only have a smattering of their morale affected, and heroes are unaffected. The thing that would make the fiery shot not as effective as the normal kind is the fact that it is not very accurate.

That is a very interesting notion. Initially I thought that fire projectiles would just be a simple technological upgrade, but I like your idea as well. Since we don't have morale, a "morale decrease" could be simulated with a reduced attack, as you suggest. The icon to toggle attack type could look like a flame.

Another idea would be to make fire projectiles bonused vs. buildings and mechanical units (ships, siege). That way you could have ranged soldiers able to attack buildings. Attack rate would decrease though and be less accurate if you were shooting at other soldiers.

Regardless if we ever run with either idea, I would like the ability to alter a unit's 'accuracy' stat. Specifically I would make a ranged unit "more accurate" as it levels up. This seems more realistic than simply making an Elite soldier's arrow a heavier attack than a Basic soldier's arrow, even though an arrow is an arrow. Making accuracy increase as the unit levels up would be more realistic, yet effectively give the higher unit an "increased" average attack.

At any rate, the fire projectiles are currently only implemented to show off our new particle system and to look cool.

[Macgruber]

-snip

I do have to agree with you on the need for some realism when it comes to depict marines on the decks.

However, I think that there is a better method for the gameplay mechanic.

Civilian ships would work in much the same way as you describe above, only being able to support a single crew...

Military ships would have a dedicated fighting force stationed onboard, possibly consisting of soldiers you load onboard, removing the need to remain stationary, and thusly making a dedicated navy useful, while still making it possible to retain something in the way of a civilian defense.

[IS_NormanDuck]

Playing 0ad for the first times i have noticed a couple of things on military unit behaviour. If i can, i may suggest:

- when a military unit automatically chooses a target, enemy units would be preferred on enemy buildings, and

- when a military unit has automatically choosen a building as a target, and an enemy unit passes near the mil unit, it would switch target from the building to the unit, and

- when a military units has automatically choosen a non-fighting civilian target (female) and it is attacked by another enemy, it would switch target from the civilian to the enemy

[oshron]

- when a military units has automatically choosen a non-fighting civilian target (female) and it is attacked by another enemy, it would switch target from the civilian to the enemy

speaking of this in particular, wouldnt it be cool if there was an editor-only "Slave Driver" unit for campaigns and scenarios? suppose someone makes a scenario with a fictional setting where they play an enslaved celtic people rebelling against the romans, and the first thing they need to do is fight back against the local slave drivers, who look like standard roman infantry but carry whips

[Mythos_Ruler]

Playing 0ad for the first times i have noticed a couple of things on military unit behaviour. If i can, i may suggest:

- when a military unit automatically chooses a target, enemy units would be preferred on enemy buildings, and

- when a military unit has automatically choosen a building as a target, and an enemy unit passes near the mil unit, it would switch target from the building to the unit, and

- when a military units has automatically choosen a non-fighting civilian target (female) and it is attacked by another enemy, it would switch target from the civilian to the enemy

I think the team agrees to these notions. It's just a matter of having someone to work on that particular feature. Eventually meat units (soldiers, cavalry) won't attack buildings at all--they'll try to capture them instead and will auto-target only enemy units. Likewise, siege engines will auto-acquire buildings instead of other units (unless tasked to do so, of course). Siege Rams shouldn't attack units at all (except maybe enemy siege engines), and should focus solely on buildings.

[feneur]

I think the team agrees to these notions. It's just a matter of having someone to work on that particular feature. Eventually meat units (soldiers, cavalry) won't attack buildings at all--they'll try to capture them instead and will auto-target only enemy units. Likewise, siege engines will auto-acquire buildings instead of other units (unless tasked to do so, of course). Siege Rams shouldn't attack units at all (except maybe enemy siege engines), and should focus solely on buildings.

I agree at least And I haven't heard anyone else with a different opinion on this matter.

[IS_NormanDuck]

Thanks for the answers

I was also thinking about another suggestion. Since military non-siege units destroy buildings very slowly, so pheraps there may be another status for buildings: "burned building". This mean that non siege military units may burn a building quite fast, anyway faster then the time necessary to destroy it, and the building would be still on the map but unable to be active. For ex, burned houses no longer support population and no longer allow to train female citizen, burned barrax no longer allow to train military unit.

A burned building would return active when it would be repaired by workers for a given percentage (50% for example) from the "burned status"

[hdd]

Hi Guys,

more a question than a suggestion (as i think is already been discussed...)

Water is going to be a resource ?

As all the cities are born around rivers and lakes , it might be a nice addition to have .

It might be something that goes with the barracks , to maintain the population level.

Having water as resource , would also might introduce some interesting tactics behavior .

of course , only non fighting char should be able gather the water.... so they should be accompanied by some fighting chars to protect them...

Just 2c

Cheers.

L.

p.S

as the civilization evolves , wells might be a an upgrade object to be build to not expose the city

Edited April 29, 2011 by hdd

[Mythos_Ruler]

Thanks for the answers

I was also thinking about another suggestion. Since military non-siege units destroy buildings very slowly, so pheraps there may be another status for buildings: "burned building". This mean that non siege military units may burn a building quite fast, anyway faster then the time necessary to destroy it, and the building would be still on the map but unable to be active. For ex, burned houses no longer support population and no longer allow to train female citizen, burned barrax no longer allow to train military unit.

A burned building would return active when it would be repaired by workers for a given percentage (50% for example) from the "burned status"

Not bad suggestions, but I'd rather units focus on capturing buildings instead, which will be a pretty integral feature of the game once it's implemented.

[oshron]

perhaps a burning function could be added in a later release? it sounds like it would be a good feature and alternative to capturing buildings. i would recommend that it be something that isnt done automatically; you have to actually TELL the soldiers to burn a building in order for them to do it

[Thorfinn the Shallow Minded]

I would like to give a couple more suggestions with experience. The whole idea is cool, but it seems relatively unrealistic for a soldier to merely change his armor when he upgrades. My idea is that instead of showing that a guy has a lot of experience with his appearance in that respect, instead, when a unit is selected, they show how much how much of a veteran he is by the chevrons that hover over their health bar. The chevrons would first be bronze, but once they attain three, their the unit would have a gold chevron instead, after they have three gold chevrons, they would acquire a silver chevron. The armor could be used for various technologies such as a Corinthian helmet upgrade, a cuirass upgrade, etc,... The important thing to that could make it more unique with these technologies is having only the units trained wielding these if you put that armor for automatic use. In this way, one could have the ability to toggle between a lighter armor that allows for more speed, and a heavier one that has a lot more bulk. The units that have been trained before the upgrade do not have an automated upgrade, but for a small price of metal or wood, one could update it to the latest kind of armor. The way I would commend having the upgrades be done is similar to Empire Earth. In that game, there were many various upgrades on the unit armor/attack that surrounded the GUI of the unit you were controlling that only needed a click to update.

Edited May 1, 2011 by Thorfinn the Shallow Minded

[Alagos]

Not to act as a contrarian, but am I the only one that liked the stats bars (health, resources) better when they had no "bevel" effect? Besides that, I wanted to point out that particles don't work for me, so if you plan to make important things with those (especially fiery projectiles) make sure to have some fallback system.

[Ykkrosh]

Particles only work in the shader-based rendering mode, so I guess you're getting the non-shader one (which should usually only happen on extremely low-end hardware or non-Gallium ATI drivers on Linux). It should be possible to make them work in non-shader mode (though it's more code and less efficient) so we should probably do that.

[General Octavian]

I have trouble on my XP with shadows. They look green

[fabio]

I have trouble on my XP with shadows. They look green

You may try updating your graphics drivers.