Suggestions for 0 A.D.

[ffm2]

Action macros

Save some commands to a macro and play them when the situation appears (execute order 66).

Usefull e.g.:

• you expect a cav rush.
• you have one to send rams to a fort and another to pull the rams back and repair them, repeat at wish
• send all cav back (from a raid) to your farmsteads, which have now produced some animals for them

[nani]

15 hours ago, ffm2 said:

select all wounded units

Alt + O should select all wounded units on the map. Alt + . already selects all idle workers on the map and mouse selection + O selects wounded.

You can do this with the most recent version of autociv creating your own custom  entity (unit) selection hotkey and specifying what to select with filters 

Example for your case (add line to user.cfg):

hotkey.autociv.session.entity.by.class.select.Soldier&!Ship.by.health.wounded = "Alt+O"  

Edited April 24, 2020 by nani

[nani]

16 hours ago, ffm2 said:

team line style

Indicate teams with line style on the border. E.g. Team 1 full line "---------", Team 2 dashed "- - - -", Team 3 "- . - . - . -"

This can be done easy with a dotted sprite and some code changes

Edited April 24, 2020 by nani

[Dithless]

One thing I want to see added is the ability to change what state units are trained in. It's slightly annoying to have to manually change them to defensive from aggressive each time I train a new batch. 

The thing that probably needs the most improvement is the unit pathfinding; it's agonizing to launch an attack or order a retreat then watch my units waddle back and forth after each other just because one of them got stuck in a tree or something. This is especially a problem on wooded maps. 

Just a quick note, I'm not entirely sure all of the translations for the Mauryans are correct. A temple would be a "mandir", not a "devalaya" which just translates to "god place" in Sanskrit, for example. I can help to some extent with that, but I don't know enough Sanskrit or Prakrit to do the voice overs. 

[Heródoto]

First of all, I would like to congratulate all the team behind this project. This is the best RTS I've ever played, because it combines almost everything: art, realism, strategy, originality, etc. I've played a lot of RTS like WC and SC, (they have great technical gameplay). So I'd like to give you some recommendations to improve the game because there are things that can be better without much effort. I hope the developers can read this. And again, this is a great game!

First, the selection of specific units and targets is sometimes very tedious. The main inconvenience of this type happens on naval maps, when we construct the buildings more together, they cover the units and it is difficult to select them when they are behind a building or put a meeting point near your buildings. Another example when you finish mastering an enemy tower and want to select it to self-destruct, it is often difficult to click it because the units around it cover it, sometimes also the trees cover it. I know this is fixed many times by moving the camera, but that's not practical. Something similar happens sometimes when you decide to attack an enemy unit that is between trees with infantry and often you will take out wood and not chase it (of course if you adjust your camera this can help, but as I said before it is not practical).
SOLUTION: I -- as a novice player I am -- I think that happens because the unit selection is made around the unit, but I think it would be improved if the selection of the units would be made around their circle of selection that they have in the field. 

Second. Obligatory garrison of towers (and siege towers) and ships to have a decent attack. This slows down the strategic gameplay because you have to add soldiers at all times to these types of units. It also takes away realism (although it seems otherwise) as all soldiers give the same damage regardless of whether or not they have more damage due to rank or a damage update. This could be explained if the soldier finds other weapons in those structures and replaced their weapons, but usually that didn't happen.

POSSIBLE SOLUTION: I think this problem is the solution to another problem where you sought to balance the towers and boats so that they are not op. Perhaps one of the options they ruled out was to make the construction of towers occupy population, but the solution can be a combination of both factors . It would more or less look like this:
Advanced tower (wooden): occupies 1-0 population, gives 0-1 garrison (this tower is the one that presents the least incovenient, could leave it as it is)
Tower 1: occupies 2-5 population, gives 3-5 garrison
Tower 2: occupies 3-10 population, gives 5-10 garrison
Fixed siege tower (if it exists): occupies 5-10, gives 2-5 garrison
Mobilble siege tower (built in fortresses) occupies 5-12 population, gives 10-12 garrison approximately
Light and medium boats: 2-5 population, gives approximately 8-30 garrison
Heavier boats: 5-8 population, gives 30-45 garrison

By making these changes, you would have to increase the damage of towers and ships as they occupy population, in addition to other adjustments such as build distance or perhaps, only perhaps a limit for certain types of structures according to the level of the CC. The goal of this is to make ships and towers more military, something like siege machines.

Third. The phallic Babilonic tanks and elephants with archers are almost useless in the current game. First there is the penchygeon stroller, it is only driven by 1 person who does not seem to drive and essentially only has more life and mobility than an archer. They should make it cost 2 population (driver and archer as it really was), make it possible for you to attack automatically while moving and so that it is not OP to lower the range as it is difficult to shoot great distances with precision while moving at high speed. In addition, I saw that they have a detail on their tires and that detail can be used to make melee units (perhaps not lancers) attacking the Babylonian falcado tank lose life. Something similar could be done to the elephant with Hindu archer, the damage to melee units could be caused by the elephant. The goal is to make them more useful. But not as OPs as battering rams xd

Like many other players, I don't lack ideas, so just say the ones I think seem most useful to developers (there's more where they came from).
I've seen many of your discussions in these forums and I know that your game, the way you're developing it, has a lot of potential, from soldier-workers' ideas to naval and territorial battles. Remember that there are games like Dota 2 that came from independent projects, where marketing doesn't matter and where the dreams of a community are reflected with total freedom. Playing something that has been done with such fullness does not need strategy to be played, the game creates the kind of strategy needed to be played. It is only in you to decide the right path to the greatness of this game. 

Forgive the grammar, I don't write English often. Thank you for this great game and don't forget to make rams only can attack buildings by putting 0 their cut damage (maybe) and reduce the size of merchant and warships as they are often stuck in a epic way. And making women unable to build military buildings, so Spartans would be more useful.

 

 

Edited June 6, 2020 by Heródoto
Tipography

[Mr.lie]

Would be nice if we could have a "bow wave" and "tail wave" for ships something like this:

(Pictures taken from https://skotschir.de/2019/04/anno-1800-schiffs-uebersicht/)

 

 

 

 

Without this the ships seems to be floating:

 

 

Edited June 13, 2020 by Mr.lie

[asterix]

10 minutes ago, Mr.lie said:

Would be nice if we could have a "bow wave" and "tail wave" for ships something like this:

(Pictures taken from https://skotschir.de/2019/04/anno-1800-schiffs-uebersicht/)

 

 

 

 

Without this the ships seems to be floating:

 

 

Nice idea I believe @wraitii and @vladislavbelov did some prototyping with waves https://code.wildfiregames.com/M4 

[soloooy0]

I have tried the svn, and the siege workshops are all the same price, it is not logical
In order to produce tastings, bolts, siege tower and rams, you need a greater capacity, size and tools than to produce just one ram for example
the Macedonian siege workshop has to be somewhat more expensive, have more health and capture points, since it is the one with the highest capacity
instead the Celts would be cheaper since they only produce one thing
Could the castle of Athens and Sparta be given the improvement of the bulwark tower? so it would be useful against a siege of slingers
I love the new sounds of javelins, bows and slingers
I like the new regular unit icons
I need to try more to comment more, the A24 looks good

the Iberian brulets, need a favorable balance, now they are a huge expense that can bankruptcy in the naval games, especially against cata ship, rome and especially ptl, if the fire could be activated when taking damage or at contact, it would be useful and not

Edited June 13, 2020 by soloooy0
me deje una cosa

[asterix]

2 minutes ago, soloooy0 said:

I have tried the svn, and the siege workshops are all the same price, it is not logical
In order to produce tastings, bolts, siege tower and rams, you need a greater capacity, size and tools than to produce just one ram for example
the Macedonian siege workshop has to be somewhat more expensive, have more health and capture points, since it is the one with the highest capacity
instead the Celts would be cheaper since they only produce one thing
Could the castle of Athens and Sparta be given the improvement of the bulwark tower? so it would be useful against a siege of slingers
I love the new sounds of javelins, bows and slingers
I like the new regular unit icons
I need to try more to comment more, the A24 looks good

Nice thoughts, lots of these are gameplay related so I ping @Nescio  please look at his thread and patches and try to comment there 

 

[Charles Martel]

To make archers unique, what if archers have circular splash damage: same damage as normal, ~1 meter or less range with friendly fire. Then, if they miss and hit a different unit, it would still deal damage.

[happyconcepts]

4 hours ago, Charles Martel said:

To make archers unique, what if archers have circular splash damage: same damage as normal, ~1 meter or less range with friendly fire. Then, if they miss and hit a different unit, it would still deal damage.

This mitigates "dancing" if the splash damage catches the dancer, anyhow that was my thinking last month. I put 10m range splash damage for cannon in the Aye Pirates mod ... but I'm not a dancer so I cannot confirm that it is effective.

[MrLux]

While playing I realised that the wolves have a 10 value of attack slash and piercing. A initial infantry has between 1-3, and that creates the weird and frustrating thing were two or more  wolves wipe villagers going foraging and even the initial cavalery. I don't get why they are so powerful.

[Ceniros]

I would love to see Civil Unrest in the game. Like when a roman takes over a gaul Civic Center, they would try to rebel against the conquer or separatists try to take over a city and you have to send in your troops to stop them. I think that would be interesting

[Ceniros]

I would love to see a feature that gives each individual unit their own names like the total war series. Like it picks a random name for the unit .Like a roman soldier being named Augustus.

[myou5e]

8 hours ago, Ceniros said:

I would love to see a feature that gives each individual unit their own names like the total war series. Like it picks a random name for the unit .Like a roman soldier being named Augustus.

I actually want to do this, as well as create some randomness for each unit in Stats. Let's say when "Brutus" is spawned on the map, he gets +10HP, when "Lyle"  is spawned he gets "-10HP" .

They are separate things, I don't mean to paint everyone called "Brutus" or "Lyle" with the same brush, I'm just saying I would like to give name randomness AND some stat randomness, but generally they would be independently randomized

Edited August 20, 2020 by myou5e

[Ceniros]

On 8/20/2020 at 3:53 AM, myou5e said:

I actually want to do this, as well as create some randomness for each unit in Stats. Let's say when "Brutus" is spawned on the map, he gets +10HP, when "Lyle"  is spawned he gets "-10HP" .

They are separate things, I don't mean to paint everyone called "Brutus" or "Lyle" with the same brush, I'm just saying I would like to give name randomness AND some stat randomness, but generally they would be independently randomized

Your saying each same type of unit would have different stats. I think there could be a setting that enables a feature that makes one of them have higher stats than the other. There could also be a loyalty system where if his loyalty stats is low he would betray you and convert to gaia.

[myou5e]

3 hours ago, Ceniros said:

Your saying each same type of unit would have different stats. I think there could be a setting that enables a feature that makes one of them have higher stats than the other. There could also be a loyalty system where if his loyalty stats is low he would betray you and convert to gaia.

Yes, same type of unit could have slightly randomized stats, and an individual name. I would also like to have most units eventually gain Hero status with enough experience. And their  hero auras would be based partially on their randomized statistics. It's a mechanic that suits small scale battle, I think. Loyalty could be one of those stats. Units with high Loyalty will cost more to bribe and maybe will have an encouragement aura.

[Ceniros]

24 minutes ago, myou5e said:

Yes, same type of unit could have slightly randomized stats, and an individual name. I would also like to have most units eventually gain Hero status with enough experience. And their  hero auras would be based partially on their randomized statistics. It's a mechanic that suits small scale battle, I think. Loyalty could be one of those stats. Units with high Loyalty will cost more to bribe and maybe will have an encouragement aura.

Units gaining hero stats would be interesting. Also we can divide the names based on gender as well just in case somebody wants to make a female unit that fights

[Servo]

Since I started playing from A21 up to now I never noticed any changes in mechanics except balancing and few fixes just to maintain the game running and playable. No one even dared to itrdiminish spamming of units 
 

I know that the programming side has limited manpower which will really stall the game to its current state. Are there any dev members (On the programming area) really interested to further introduce other mechanics like ammo, armory,  supply wagon, and other defense structures. Also citizen-soldiers are fine but could they just start from being regular peasants but once upgraded to citizen soldiers could they just be builders as they really look like professional soldiers?  
 

Any new mechanics don’t need to be incorporated to the main game but just place those into the repository so that some modders can use such new assets. 
 

Any new addition/s might require added micromanagement but imo it is where great games can evolve. It’s not just about fast spamming units but rather adding more depth to the game. 
 

You train soldiers with just food and wood/metal but no weapons and armor (units have armor stats) being produced. You make towers and forts that fire projectiles without garrisoned range units (same as ghost warships), you train range organic units and sieges with unlimited projectiles. What’s the reason why I the mechanics can’t be closer to realistic? As I’ve said these things don’t need to be in the main game in which MP games are the top priority. 
 

I think the programming side are not capable, ofc I’m not capable because the field is not what I studied or trained for. Alexandermb and other art members is/are really working quite hard to do animations for possible changes that may be introduced. 
 

The players are trying to contribute so that when funds can be collected perhaps the devs can hire a good programmer/s Or why not give some monetary reward/s to the dev members? At least each and everyone’s contribution were not only recognized but rather rewarded. 

[myou5e]

Some of the things you mentioned are actually already available for modders.

For example

• Ghost Ships
• Ghost Towers
• Ammo Cost(in 0abc mod I think?)

Ammo cost hasn't been introduced into the main game, because they want to do it properly the first time, same with other features such as secondary attacks.

Alot of players will probably like the fact that towers fire default arrows without a garrison. I do like the idea of needing them to be manned. The Viking ships(from Millenium AD) would look amazing with a Visible Garrison instead of the ordinary Garrison inside.

Here are some features I am working on integrating and making into my own mod.

• Ghost Ships (Visible garrisons)
• Ghost Towers
• Integrating ammo cost from 0abc
• Switchable Weapons
• Loot will be increased, especially for buildings and farms, and must be collected as a resource and carried back manually, but wagons can also do this job and can pack large amounts of loot on them.
• Seasons and seasonal food. Food is not gathered at gradual pace but gets ready at seasons. Bushes and farms don't expire, they just have seasonal produce.
• Citizens automatically spawn from houses and are cheap or free to build, but they have an upkeep cost. You therefore always need a proportion to gather food, otherwise they will starve to death, which is even more of a danger with seasons if your farms get destroyed in a raid before harvest!
• All Citizens can pick up women from the blacksmith or barracks, including women, who aren't as strong, but would still be a good last line of defense, especially if your men have all died at war!
• "Phases" are true phases, not "ages". There is no researching of "Town" or "City" phase, but your Civil Center is automatically promoted when you have enough nearby buildings. This means you can have some Villages and some Towns and some Cities, and the Town Phase buildings can only be built in Towns or Cities, not Villages.
• Citizens are cheap or free, but they are unexperienced. I want a  far more extensive promotion system as follows. Promotion can happen across all of these classes, so that Citizens can become Heroes eventually.
  • Citizen (No experience)
  • Citizen Soldier (Rudimentary training)
  • Professional Soldier (Battle Hardened)
  • Champion (Experts)
  • Hero (Expert Experts :-) )
• Fauna have a "manure" aura, they help farms to produce more food, BUT they also eat the crops if they are too close!! This should result in nice farming communities that combine animals and crops together, but have little wooden fences to keep the animals away from crops
• Houses can be used defensively and fire arrows, but they are also much easier to destroy with swords, axes, and fire arrows, are also easier to capture, and eject at 50% health, instead of 10%
• Individual names and Stats
• Can pick up items

^The only features above which I do not know how to do well, right now, are Seasons, Individual names and Stats, and pick up Items. I will definitely tag you when I have an implementation of my mod out so you can play test for me . I'm curious what you think of the things I mentioned above. The Upkeep cost replacing Upfront resource cost is a big change that a lot of people won't like, probably. It doesn't have to be that way, it's just something I want to try!

 

I'm pretty sure there are actually no full time developers. The programmers all commit their free time to the project :). I also understand your frustration because this game is really cool and feels like it has so much potential but mechanics do seem to take a long time to add.

Edited August 25, 2020 by myou5e

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

On 6/13/2020 at 4:52 PM, asterix said:

Nice idea I believe @wraitii and @vladislavbelov did some prototyping with waves https://code.wildfiregames.com/M4 

M2 would be nice to have too.

https://code.wildfiregames.com/M2

@Sandarac

Edited August 25, 2020 by wowgetoffyourcellphone

[Rolf Dew]

4 hours ago, Servo said:

Since I started playing from A21 up to now I never noticed any changes in mechanics except balancing and few fixes just to maintain the game running and playable. No one even dared to itrdiminish spamming of units 
 

I know that the programming side has limited manpower which will really stall the game to its current state. Are there any dev members (On the programming area) really interested to further introduce other mechanics like ammo, armory,  supply wagon, and other defense structures. Also citizen-soldiers are fine but could they just start from being regular peasants but once upgraded to citizen soldiers could they just be builders as they really look like professional soldiers?  
 

Any new mechanics don’t need to be incorporated to the main game but just place those into the repository so that some modders can use such new assets. 
 

Any new addition/s might require added micromanagement but imo it is where great games can evolve. It’s not just about fast spamming units but rather adding more depth to the game. 
 

You train soldiers with just food and wood/metal but no weapons and armor (units have armor stats) being produced. You make towers and forts that fire projectiles without garrisoned range units (same as ghost warships), you train range organic units and sieges with unlimited projectiles. What’s the reason why I the mechanics can’t be closer to realistic? As I’ve said these things don’t need to be in the main game in which MP games are the top priority. 
 

I think the programming side are not capable, ofc I’m not capable because the field is not what I studied or trained for. Alexandermb and other art members is/are really working quite hard to do animations for possible changes that may be introduced. 
 

The players are trying to contribute so that when funds can be collected perhaps the devs can hire a good programmer/s Or why not give some monetary reward/s to the dev members? At least each and everyone’s contribution were not only recognized but rather rewarded. 

I think the thing with added mechanics like ammo, supply wagons, towers that need to be garrisoned to function, is that for the dev's to add things like that, they would need to also know if they want the game to go in that direction or even if majority of the player base would like the game to have increased micro management and complexity, while some of these features might be great for one that likes a more realistic game (like myself and some others), it might put off others that prefer a game similiar to tradional rts games. It's hard to balance the two when it comes to adding game changing features, some in the community prefer the game to be like age of empires, while others want it to have more city simulation aspects, still others want it to have more total war features and so on. 

[myou5e]

3 hours ago, Rolf Dew said:

I think the thing with added mechanics like ammo, supply wagons, towers that need to be garrisoned to function, is that for the dev's to add things like that, they would need to also know if they want the game to go in that direction or even if majority of the player base would like the game to have increased micro management and complexity, while some of these features might be great for one that likes a more realistic game (like myself and some others), it might put off others that prefer a game similiar to tradional rts games. It's hard to balance the two when it comes to adding game changing features, some in the community prefer the game to be like age of empires, while others want it to have more city simulation aspects, still others want it to have more total war features and so on. 

The good thing about Open Source, is that with the right mechanics available, modders can turn it into whatever they like. There are ways to have these realistic aspects while keeping the micro down. With the towers, one of the ways would be to have the town bell on autopilot so that the closest military units manned the tower, and the civilians ran into the houses. Actually, this is already quite easily doable in Javascript and is one thing I plan to do for my mod.

[Rolf Dew]

@myou5e Right being open source and very mod friendly, allows all kinds of different gameplay mods to be made. 

[myou5e]

2 hours ago, Rolf Dew said:

@myou5e Right being open source and very mod friendly, allows all kinds of different gameplay mods to be made. 

Here is a Readme from my Github with a description of the Mod that I have planned. The Readme is in a sub directory because it's part of a larger project. I have actually implemented about 50% or 60% probably in small test cases but not over the whole project.

Ars Bellica