Suggestions for 0 A.D.

[krt0143]

On 19/08/2023 at 12:45 AM, Emacz said:

It really bothers me that if someone attacks a single unit on the woodline (or anywhere) the remaining units continue working as if nothing happend.  One suggestion i heard was control groups, which i use!  So a more specific example would be if Im attacking the opponent and they send a counter attack to my woodline, they can pick the women off 1 by one and the men continue to chop.  I dont know im being attacked, because Im attacking/being attacked at their base.  So the idea would be that when set in agressive stance they will stop what they are doing and fight within X distance of each other.  So if one unit gets attacked woodline other units within X would fight alongside.  Does that make sense? is it possible?

Definitely, and that's a pet peeve of mine too. When working, you can hack them to pieces, they won't react, so you need to constantly babysit them and tell them there is somebody killing them, do something already!

Given in 0 A.D. workers are soldiers, they should react if somebody gets attacked in they immediate vicinity, fight, and then only go back to whatever they were doing.

[alre]

2 hours ago, krt0143 said:

Definitely, and that's a pet peeve of mine too. When working, you can hack them to pieces, they won't react, so you need to constantly babysit them and tell them there is somebody killing them, do something already!

Given in 0 A.D. workers are soldiers, they should react if somebody gets attacked in they immediate vicinity, fight, and then only go back to whatever they were doing.

that isn't necessarily better than doing nothing. It could lead to mass suicide. Fleeing looks like a much better default to me. In the end the player needs to handle it anyway.

[Gurken Khan]

7 minutes ago, alre said:

Fleeing looks like a much better default to me.

Mmm. That can lead to a unit slowly being killed without dishing out retribution; it's not like they're fleeing into a secure building. I usually have my CS on aggressive, but that also depends on what work they're doing and at what point of the map they are.

But I agree that the player should handle it. Besides the text warning there's also the flashing on the minimap, one should look at that frequently imho.

[alre]

47 minutes ago, Gurken Khan said:

Mmm. That can lead to a unit slowly being killed without dishing out retribution; it's not like they're fleeing into a secure building. I usually have my CS on aggressive, but that also depends on what work they're doing and at what point of the map they are.

But I agree that the player should handle it. Besides the text warning there's also the flashing on the minimap, one should look at that frequently imho.

fleeing to a safe building would be even better, yes. I have suggested creating a command maybe called "find shelter" that makes the selection run to the nearest building that can host them, I hadn't thought about making it automatic with a stance though.

Excluding this option (I'm not creating it) I'd be happy if units were passive by default, and switched automatically to aggressive when first given a command for attacking. Maybe this mod I can create.

[krt0143]

1 hour ago, alre said:

that isn't necessarily better than doing nothing. It could lead to mass suicide. Fleeing looks like a much better default to me.

It depends: If your working units are fighting units, it's just another fight, much like if they were standing around.

If they are not fighting units, they should take shelter, running away is pointless.

[krt0143]

7 minutes ago, alre said:

 if units were passive by default, and switched automatically to aggressive when first given a command for attacking.

What for? When given a command to attack they always attack, no matter what stance they're in. I don't understand.

The point here was more about being able to quit an assigned job automatically when/if a friend nearby starts taking damage.

[alre]

41 minutes ago, krt0143 said:

It depends: If your working units are fighting units, it's just another fight, much like if they were standing around.

I'm not considering units standing around simply because units shouldn't generally stand around, but in fact, whenever I've left some unit standing as a sentinel, I put him on passive.

[alre]

38 minutes ago, krt0143 said:

What for? When given a command to attack they always attack, no matter what stance they're in. I don't understand.

they don't if they are on passive stance.

38 minutes ago, krt0143 said:

The point here was more about being able to quit an assigned job automatically when/if a friend nearby starts taking damage.

I think that would be bad and potentially exploitable by your enemy, think about how archer cav would be a lot more effective at disrupting eco. It's almost always better to delay the fight as much as possible.

[krt0143]

13 hours ago, alre said:

they don't if they are on passive stance.

I see.

 

13 hours ago, alre said:

think about how archer cav would be a lot more effective at disrupting eco.

More effective? Are you sure? (Genuine question, not rhetorical)
As it is now they will just kill your units one by one, which also disrupts your economy, through lost work + those units' cost in resources and training time.

(I admit I'm new to 0 A.D., but I'm a veteran in AoE, where this strategy is terribly efficient against the AI)

[krt0143]

New suggestion, and IMHO a quite important one:

Please show the group number on grouped units! (as a tiny floating number?)
In the map view, and/or (at very least) on the portrait when selected.

Quick example: I have 3 cavalry scouts I've hotkeyed as Ctrl-8, 9 and 0. When I see one on the map, I'd like to know on a glance which one it is, and not have to push 8, 9 and 0 to see which key (if any) selects it... I've been using groups a lot, for years, and without displaying the individual memberships on the screen they lose half of their interest (you can't use them to easily keep apart different task groups of identical units).

[krt0143]

A couple minimap suggestions. The 0 A.D. minimap can easily be improved:

1. Please highlight the selected unit(s) on the minimap (in white) so you can see where they are.

2. Minimap visibility is not optimal, especially given the player is in dark blue and thus tend to blend into the background. Would it be possible to mute (de-saturate?) the minimap background, so that important features (units, buildings) stick out more?

3. Or even create a set of display filters for the minimap, like "Show only units/buildings on a gray background", "show only friends/enemies", "show only resources".

 

[alre]

24 minutes ago, krt0143 said:

A couple minimap suggestions. The 0 A.D. minimap can easily be improved:

1. Please highlight the selected unit(s) on the minimap (in white) so you can see where they are.

2. Minimap visibility is not optimal, especially given the player is in dark blue and thus tend to blend into the background. Would it be possible to mute (de-saturate?) the minimap background, so that important features (units, buildings) stick out more?

3. Or even create a set of display filters for the minimap, like "Show only units/buildings on a gray background", "show only friends/enemies", "show only resources".

try BoonGui mod, it enlarges the minimap and changes players colors.

47 minutes ago, krt0143 said:

(I admit I'm new to 0 A.D., but I'm a veteran in AoE, where this strategy is terribly efficient against the AI)

these games are very different in the way eco is managed by units that are also fighters.

[Gurken Khan]

28 minutes ago, krt0143 said:

the player is in dark blue

You can change the players' colors in the match setup.

[krt0143]

Just now, Gurken Khan said:

You can change the players' colors in the match setup.

Yes, I know, but that doesn't really solve the problem, it just moves it.

Slightly muting the minimap background would solve it once for all, and it's quite easy to do too.

 

[krt0143]

Oops, missed your post.

 

22 minutes ago, alre said:

try BoonGui mod, it enlarges the minimap and changes players colors.

these games are very different in the way eco is managed by units that are also fighters.

Sure, but why not make it a standard game feature? I mean, everything can be added externally, but the game should be self-sufficient.

As for the economy, except the excellent idea to drop the specialized male peasants, there is IMHO not much difference. It still boils down to controlling/harvesting specific resources and preventing the adversary from doing so. 

[alre]

20 minutes ago, krt0143 said:

Sure, but why not make it a standard game feature? I mean, everything can be added externally, but the game should be self-sufficient.

this is a question of organization of the game development and it's not a simple subject, ideally you a right, but suffice it to say that the main releases of the games are actually on a halt right now.

22 minutes ago, krt0143 said:

As for the economy, except the excellent idea to drop the specialized male peasants, there is IMHO not much difference. It still boils down to controlling/harvesting specific resources and preventing the adversary from doing so. 

well, in AoE there is no harm to use your soldiers in any other way than let them kill themselves, in 0AD you want them to do eco rather than chase enemies they can't catch. By simply having them distracted, you are lagging behind in economy.

[krt0143]

26 minutes ago, alre said:

suffice it to say that the main releases of the games are actually on a halt right now.

All right, that's a piece of information I didn't have.
I saw RC27 was released and thought the development process is ongoing (albeit very slow, as usually for that kind of project).

A pity, this game is great. Needs just some polishing, there are just some rough edges remaining. You people are most likely used to them by now (and know how to bypass them), but they are obvious to a newcomer like me.

[krt0143]

In the list of those "please, pretty pretty please, must have" features, allow us to set the stance units built in a building arrive in. (i.e. being able to set that units built in a given building will rather default to "defensive"/"passive", etc.).

Right now new units always default to "aggressive" -- and off they go to conquer the world all on their own, one after the other. It's like herding cats, only more annoying. I've lost more units to irrepressible blood lust than to enemy action...

[krt0143]

Right now Gaia is always hostile to everybody, and that can't be changed.
Please make it possible for scenario makers to set Gaia stance to neutral vs. the AI player(s) and vice versa.

If set, Gaia would only attack the human player, it wouldn't attack the AI player(s)' units, and the AI player(s) wouldn't attack Gaia (besides hunting/fishing and such, but I think those don't count as aggressions).

The point is to prevent an overeager AI from cleaning up any hostile wildlife for you, and/or to prevent the AI from suffering from hostile wildlife attacks in scenarios where Gaia is kind of an additional adversary.

[Gurken Khan]

On 09/09/2023 at 3:32 PM, krt0143 said:

off they go

A stance button for production buildings would be nice. @krt0143 Do you know about rally points? With selected production building(s) right click on a point/res/building and units will go there (+CTRL to garrison inside production building).

I'm ok with Gaia being a wildcard, and I think hunting is aggression towards Gaia. So I don't know if it would be possible to make it neutral with an AI player and that AI player still be able to hunt.

[krt0143]

3 hours ago, Gurken Khan said:

Do you know about rally points?

Sure but it doesn't change anything. If any enemy units comes near, your units will start chasing them, instead of waiting for whatever task you had planned for them.
Of course you could set that rally point way back, in safe lands, somewhere no enemy will ever be seen, but then what's the point of creating unit facilities near the front lines?... Also sometimes it's just not possible, so you're forced to micromanage, wait for every new recruit and quickly set him manually to "Defensive".

It would be so much easier if you could set the building to create units with a given stance, like in AoE.

 

3 hours ago, Gurken Khan said:

I'm ok with Gaia being a wildcard, and I think hunting is aggression towards Gaia.

It depends: From a PvP perspective, Gaia should indeed be aggressive against everybody. But in a player vs. computer game perspective, you just want to up the challenge for the player. There is no advantage in having the AI fight with itself.

Also, that "aggression" thing was meant from a coding point of view: I wouldn't be surprised if Gaia has no code stating that "if player B attacks me, player B is to be considered an enemy", simply because it doesn't need it, since it currently defaults to being hostile to everybody.
So if you use the "neutral" option, the AI player should be able to do the worst things to Gaia -- without any chance of Gaia "getting angry".

[Gurken Khan]

Could we have a Random Random Random maps mode?

Because when I play Random Random maps a lot of maps won't come up.

[krt0143]

17 hours ago, Gurken Khan said:

Could we have a Random Random Random maps mode?

There actually is one!
It's hidden in the "Browse Maps" sub-menu.

[Gurken Khan]

12 minutes ago, krt0143 said:

There actually is one!

Ah, I guess the "all maps" filter.

[krt0143]

23 minutes ago, Gurken Khan said:

I guess the "all maps" filter.

No, no, there actually is a "Pick a random map" button (Matches/Browse Maps, lower right).
That's what you're looking for, isn't it? (Note I didn't try it, but it sounds like a "let me chose a map for you" feature.)