Suggestions for 0 A.D.

[LienRag]

On 10/07/2023 at 2:38 PM, vajei said:

In the game as it is today, the main disadvantage, in my opinion, is that it lacks dynamics.
The game more or less goes like this: each side develops as fast as it can, then when it has a siege weapon it simply makes a general attack of the whole army, whoever developed faster wins.
It takes all the strategy and thinking out of the game, you just have to learn how to develop quickly and not waste people and time, and that's almost the whole game.

 

Well, yes and no.

Technically, that's not the only possible play.

Raiding the enemy's economy is a way to gain advantage over him.

The problem is, to raid the enemy's economy without taking more losses than him you need to pay constant attention to your units, which means that you can't develop properly your own economy in the meantime, which means that players tend to rather rush for siege and then devast the enemy.

So yes, there's a problem, but not one that is that easy to solve.

 

 

On 10/07/2023 at 2:38 PM, vajei said:

For example, if one decides to send 20% of the force to make a surprise raid, and they succeed, and destroy the opponent's economy, it does not help because his 100% will crush your 80%, you will be left with 0% and he will be left with about 50%. He will conquer all of your part, and you at best will conquer his part only to lose later to the large army he still has left.

 

As I wrote above, that really depends how you play it (and especially at what time you send your raid).

But yes, though war in the ancient world was often decided by tactics and strategy rather than by sheer numbers, in 0ad it is very often the numbers that count.

 

On 10/07/2023 at 2:38 PM, vajei said:

My suggestions on the matter: 1. Fortresses and watchtowers are stronger

 

I agree that fortresses should not be that easily destroyed by siege engines - the goal of the enemy should be to bypass them, not go straight through them.

Of course if fortresses are meant to interdict an area to the enemy, there need to be a way to prevent a player to put fortresses everywhere, so s/he has to choose where to put them to maximize tactical effectiveness.

Watchtowers are good as they are imho, though. Their role is to prevent small raids and to alert to enemy attacks, they're not supposed to resist siege engines for long.

 

 

On 10/07/2023 at 2:38 PM, vajei said:

The control power of the soldiers will be smaller as they move away from their area, so that it will be necessary to conquer step by step, and not simply go straight to the opponent's base and finish the game.

That's an interesting idea, but it needs to be carefully balanced.

Going straight to the opponent's base is a valid strategy, the problem now is that it's basically the only one.
What should be is that it would be doable if the enemy doesn't fortify well (basically, if you find a way through his defenses, for example if you can trick him by a false attack elsewhere).
And not possible if the enemy prepared adequately for your attack.

[LienRag]

The problems are multi-fold¹ :

1 - The AI is so bad that the player is forced to micromanage everything, leading to multi-pronged attacks or small raids (which would allow for real tactical diversity and/or actual strategy) being much more difficult to manage than just sending one big army towards the enemy.

2 - Defense is unbalanced : Town Centers are extremely good defenses especially in early game, which is a good thing as "zerg rushes" are imho unfun; but also means that it's nearly impossible to attack before the third age (and siege weapons) beyond small cavalry raids.
For most defenses, once they're garrisonned, it's all-or-nothing : either you come with siege weapons and you've basically won, or you can't do anything.

3 - We don't have siege weapons, we have artillery : They have a way too long range (especially, compared to range of vision for buildings) and they are way too powerful and too strong against melee units. To destroy an enemy siege weapon, you need a sizable force : historically, just getting a melee unit near an enemy siege weapon usually meant that the siege weapon was toast².

4 - Terrain has very little effect (and the little effect it has is poorly documented - basically I don't know which effect it has, even though I've been playing for years³).

5 - There are very little secondary objectives. You can put most of your production around your town center, so there is very little for the enemy to do beyond a full-scale attack.

6 - The territory system is all-or-nothing. If (at high cost) you can extend your territory to some place in the map, then you can build a huge defense system there and exploit all the resources. If you can't (and possibility to do so comes only at second age) then they're nearly nothing you can do.

 

 

 

¹ Note that I don't play MP, so please tell me if I'm wrong.

² With exception for some very specific ones, like the Persians' I believe

³ Yes I'm not the best player nor that dedicated to the game, but if one has to explore all the forums and sub-forum to understand such a basic concept, it's a clear documentation problem.

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

1 hour ago, LienRag said:

5 - There are very little secondary objectives. You can put most of your production around your town center, so there is very little for the enemy to do beyond a full-scale attack.

6 - The territory system is all-or-nothing. If (at high cost) you can extend your territory to some place in the map, then you can build a huge defense system there and exploit all the resources. If you can't (and possibility to do so comes only at second age) then they're nearly nothing you can do.

In DE, the map has interesting capturable items, such as Shrines, Cultural Artifacts, Pirate Docks, and Farmsteads. One can also build your Storehouses and Granaries in neutral territory, for what I call the "Strong Core/Weak Countryside" dynamic. I've slowly started adding things kinds of things to the base game's skirmish maps, but no one plays skirmish maps on the lobby, unfortunately.

1 hour ago, LienRag said:

3 - We don't have siege weapons, we have artillery : They have a way too long range (especially, compared to range of vision for buildings) and they are way too powerful and too strong against melee units. To destroy an enemy siege weapon, you need a sizable force : historically, just getting a melee unit near an enemy siege weapon usually meant that the siege weapon was toast².

 

Yeah, base game's siege engines are kinda weird. Too much attack range, massive vision range, huuuuge Crush damage (like artillery shells). 

[LienRag]

Possible solutions :

1 - I believe the fundamental way of solving it is by enforcing the formation systems.
Units should be (as it was historically the case) basically unable to fight (except against soft targets like women, or when outrageously outnumbering the enemy) if not in formation.

I suggested "formation trees" elsewhere; that would make choosing a formation for a group of units a real tactical choice, with consequences, as changing formations out of the current branch would generate penalties.

As I already wrote many times, formations will really thrive once we have a moral system, but it's still possible to make do in the meantime.

If the AI use simple formations and knows not to change from one branch to another (except when reorganizing behind its own lines) it should be able to be good enough to keep the game playable (it's always a nice experience to outsmart the AI, as long as it's not suicidal).

 

2 - It would be probably good to introduce basic rams (tree trunk carried by a few men, without protection, and no garrison possibility) in P2. These would be vulnerable to arrows, so they won't be an option against heavily fortified enemy, but still a way to make a quick and devastating raid.

It would be nice if shielded units protected units behind them when the shooter isn't on a higher ground, too. Both in general and to make these unprotected rams both usable and vulnerable, depending on the tactical skill of each player.

 

3 - Range of siege engines should never be superior to the range of vision of military units or buildings.
Long-range siege weapons should have few hit points, normal armor against arrows, and basically no armor against melee.
Protected rams should keep their armor against arrows, but have much less against melee units (I mean, not only swordsmen or axemen).

Basically, if you can't protect your rams all the way to the enemy fortification, your offensive should fail.

Note that this suppose another thing : that some formations could be given orders to block passage of enemy units, and some other formations could be ordered to try to break a blocus.

As of now, it's quite easy to slip a few cavalryman through the enemy lines, without the defending player being able to prevent it except through extreme micromanagement.
So, we want to have a few cavalrymen (or any melee unit, actually) to quickly destroy a siege engine, but we want that result to be achieved by good tactics, not by AI failure.

 

4 - Terrain should be highly strategic : heavy units hindered in swamps or shallow water, higher ground giving multiple advantages, forest hindering tight formations, ...
Line of sight should be a factor, so strategic placement of watchtowers and outposts would be of the utmost importance (and blinding the enemy by taking out some of its outposts, too).

 

5 - This is harder to tackle. One way would of course to have more treasures on the map, but these should be tactical objectives, not random boni to the first one who gets to them.
That the first one to get to them gets an advantage in exploiting them is good, that he gets all for nearly nothing (except the cost of exploration) isn't.
Another could be to have less resources just around the Town Center, so the player would have to carefully balance risks and rewards of expanding.

Maybe give just enough stone and metal in the base territory to build another (or two other) Town Centers ? With some little surplus so that losing one extension would not mean total defeat ?
This while making P1 techs not cost any metal nor stone.

Also, make farms host fewer workers ? As of now it's possible to have 8 farms around your Town Center, so 40 women, which is nearly enough to provide food for most of your needs.
Or have farms' yield depend on soil fertility, and make the soil around the town center moderately fertile.
Or (combining the two ideas above) make the number of workers on a farm depend on the soil's fertility.

And have only a small berry patch in range of the town center, with one (or two) more farther away, near the frontier : that would allow for more devastating disruption raids.

 

6 - That is even harder to tackle. There are a lot of propositions on the various subforums, most of them resulting in basically removing the interest of territory...

Would a tiered territory aura be possible ? The core aura would work as of now, the second tier would allow for watchtowers and resource buildings, the third one would allow for non-decaying outposts (and maybe fortresses in P3).

Basically, what we want is to make possible for a player to make a move early towards some strategic point of the map, while making it possible for the other player to counter it.
This without removing the distinction between inside and outside territory...

Maybe more varied out-of-territory defenses ?

Someone proposed a maintenance cost for buildings, I'm against this idea inside territory, but it could be interesting to implement it for buildings outside of the territory...
Especially if the maintenance cost is exponential with the number of each of these defense buildings.

Basically, these defenses would need to :

- Warn early about an enemy attack

- Fend off the enemy for long enough to bring in reinforcements from workers nearby (but not from the main town center, if it's too far)

- Give a tactical advantage to the defenders once the reinforcements are in

- Help concentrate on the tactical level of the battle (i.e, limit the micromanagement of the defense by creating choke points/ taking out single units that were trying to slip through)

- But be vulnerable to a well-planned attack with superior forces

 

Also, could it be possible to have roads/lanes where movement of units is quicker ? That would allow for counterattacks and a more strategic game (as of now, if you try to counterattack, by the time you're there the enemy has usually reconstructed its defenses).
 

[LienRag]

35 minutes ago, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

In DE, the map has interesting capturable items, such as Shrines, Cultural Artifacts, Pirate Docks, and Farmsteads.

I've played DE once, and found it too weird for me.

Can't say it's bad, but it was too much of a change. And though slaves are an historical feature, I'm not comfortable with them.

 

Also, farmsteads decay outside of territory if I'm not mistaken ? That makes them nearly useless...

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

31 minutes ago, LienRag said:

I've played DE once, and found it too weird for me.

Can't say it's bad, but it was too much of a change.

Well, you have to approach it as its own thing, almost a brand new game.

 

32 minutes ago, LienRag said:

Also, farmsteads decay outside of territory if I'm not mistaken ? That makes them nearly useless...

Not in DE.

[real_tabasco_sauce]

Well siege range is already improved, now being 85 meters, which is just outside the range of archers with the tradition upgrade.

[LienRag]

On 26/10/2023 at 1:30 PM, zozio32 said:

Could i ask why?   I mean, building do need maintenance otherwise they decay in the real world ?

You may be interested by my last suggestion to have buildings outside of territory cost maintenance.

[zozio32]

On 03/11/2023 at 10:45 PM, LienRag said:

You may be interested by my last suggestion to have buildings outside of territory cost maintenance.

that could indeed be a compromise. i support also the fertility ground for the farms, but it might make some maps very difficult to play (unbale to reach population limits), but that's also nice. catching the fertile ground would become very beneficial, which is historically true also.

[zozio32]

agree also that it should not be possible for a ranged siege engine to start shooting at a building without being seen by the building first. Even more so the towers. Agree that the tower could not shoot back, but seing it at least should be ok.

[man_s_our]

On 03/11/2023 at 5:46 PM, LienRag said:

Also, make farms host fewer workers ? As of now it's possible to have 8 farms around your Town Center, so 40 women, which is nearly enough to provide food for most of your needs.
Or have farms' yield depend on soil fertility, and make the soil around the town center moderately fertile.
Or (combining the two ideas above) make the number of workers on a farm depend on the soil's fertility.
 

what I did is simply making the fields have finite amount of supplies and need water + grain to plant new ones.

I have future plan to make it more water dependent. like if there is water under it it will have positive change. otherwise it will die.

fertility is similar to my idea of global and local auras related to climate. but I intended it to be about making units that are good in desert have penalties when being in frozen maps and so on.

I think @wowgetoffyourcellphone would do great in handling this part.

[man_s_our]

for the vision, I think there should be inputs other than range.

1- instead of making the vision being simply a circle with the entity in the center, there should otherwise be more realistic. for example, a man shouldn't be able to see what's behind him. while some animals can. this can be tactically used to distract defenders or even wait for the perfect timing for sneak attack. the less resource consuming approach to this would be to have a factor that if set to 0.0 (which may be the default) the LOS would be just like used to be. while if it set to 1.0 the LOS's circle will pass straight through the entity.

2- having a night-vision ratio. this offcourse would be after adding day-night circle like in WC3. it would need some scripting but till I do it or someone else do, it can be done through auras (a invisible entity would have aura that reduce/augment vision for the entities on the entire map and has xp tickle and gets circular upgrades between day/night templates)

3- having camouflage and camouflage detection ratio. this would only effect the automatic response. if the player was on site he'd still be able to command the unit to attack the undetected unit.

Edited November 11, 2023 by man_s_our

[man_s_our]

On 03/11/2023 at 5:46 PM, LienRag said:

Also, could it be possible to have roads/lanes where movement of units is quicker ? That would allow for counterattacks and a more strategic game (as of now, if you try to counterattack, by the time you're there the enemy has usually reconstructed its defenses).
 

this too can be achieved through auras. every road piece can be a entity that's flat, have no obstruction, have aura that increase speed and for easy build it should be considered a wallstone.

Edited November 11, 2023 by man_s_our

[LienRag]

On 28/06/2022 at 4:34 PM, real_tabasco_sauce said:

in another discussion, it was suggested to increase garrison space to 16 on the largest wall segments. Part of their apparent weakness is that only 8 can sit on a wall, usually against many more units.

I think their existing armor bonus is enough.

I don't know the numbers, but they clearly die much, much quicker than they should. So quickly that it's usually useless to garrison them there if you don't intend to sacrifice them, as getting them out of harm's way when wounded is a hassle.

I also never understood the armor formula, so I can't say what would be the right values, but basically they should be heavily protected against anything thrown at them from below.

[LienRag]

1 hour ago, man_s_our said:

what I did is simply making the fields have finite amount of supplies and need water + grain to plant new ones.

Do you mean micromanagement hell like in Age of Empires ?

Or do I misunderstand your explanations ?

[LienRag]

1 hour ago, man_s_our said:

for the vision, I think there should be inputs other than range.

1- instead of making the vision being simply a circle with the entity in the center, there should otherwise be more realistic. for example, a man shouldn't be able to see what's behind him. while some animals can. this can be tactically used to distract defenders or even wait for the perfect timing for sneak attack.

Can you do that without inciting very tedious micromanagement ?

[Grautvornix]

2 hours ago, man_s_our said:

what I did is simply making the fields have finite amount of supplies and need water + grain to plant new ones.

I have future plan to make it more water dependent. like if there is water under it it will have positive change. otherwise it will die.

fertility is similar to my idea of global and local auras related to climate. but I intended it to be about making units that are good in desert have penalties when being in frozen maps and so on.

I think @wowgetoffyourcellphone would do great in handling this part.

Adding water to create better crops results is one of the central ideas dicussed also in the thread below. Here we would introduce wells as additional buildings to support watering your crops thus getting a yield even in the desert. Would be interested to get your opinion on the discussions there!

 

[man_s_our]

12 hours ago, LienRag said:

Can you do that without inciting very tedious micromanagement ?

it doesn't add micros. but adds more tactical choices.

[man_s_our]

12 hours ago, LienRag said:

Do you mean micromanagement hell like in Age of Empires ?

Or do I misunderstand your explanations ?

if implemented without the planned additions, then it would increase only few micros because supplies quantity is still big.

otherwise, the planned additions would contain some resources doesn't get destroyed when depleted (is already patched. take a look at ResourceSupply.js patch) and you can wait it to grow again, the support unit "farmer" that can "build" the trees and fields and can automatically water them and have good vegan food harvest rate.

[hamdich]

I suggest the following Changes analyse 
                   * Acceleration should be nerfed ,
                       . units have become much slower at formation or escaping .
                       . A rush can easily fail         
                       . When big numbers units sometimes freeze for 1 seconds just because of a change of                                         direction ( left to right ) due to rotation + acceleration .          
                 
                   * New Techonlogies :
                        Add a phase 2 tech that gives archer cavs/camels ability to shoot while walking but also gives                          slower mobility less DPM for expample 1.5s , less range 45m and worse accuracy . This will                              make archer cav less affective against infantry (towers ) but better against other cav 
                        which they are already too weak against.

                   * Add siege for phase 2 :
                        Smaller siege with less Hp , less DPM and armor, reasonably less expensive than the phase 3                          ones. like rams + catapults
                        the ratios between cost/ damage  damage/armor+ hp  and training time are to be figured out                            in relation with phase 3 siege
                        having good siege at phase 2 really helps some civs and makes the game better ,faster more                          enjoable and faster -> less laggy for TGs
                        for example instead of waiting for phase 3 one will be able to get rid of a ennemy tower in                                own or border territory or even attack much earlier . it opens new world of startegies because                          if doesn't work then most likely the attcker just slowing him self

                   * Heros buildings:
                    
                        Civilisations with heros whom historically kings born in ruling family or leaders who later                                    became kings should 
                        be trained from civic-centers . 
                        all the rest of civilisations train hero from unique buildings ( generals pallace ) 
                          
                        . From civic centers : kushites , ptolemies , seleucides, persians , macedonians, hans.
                           
                        . From unique buildings : gauls , britons , romans ,mauryans, atheninians ,spartans  ,                                                                                     ,carthaginians ,iberians.
                  
                        Instead of spending long building time and ressources on expensive fortress which half of                                times no need for it but just to have a hero whom potentially will die in battle and can only be                          trained once. Thats why we see Roman or carthage or iberians heros for example so rarely                              despite thier greatness.

[man_s_our]

17 hours ago, hamdich said:

                        Add a phase 2 tech that gives archer cavs/camels ability to shoot while walking

I'm already working on this one (but the archer's firing speed and accuracy is what gets negative effect by movement speed. not the opposite) in other way.

the problem is that this needs huge edits on UnitAI and some other components. so you need patience.

[Freagarach]

17 minutes ago, man_s_our said:

I'm already working on this one (but the archer's firing speed and accuracy is what gets negative effect by movement speed. not the opposite) in other way.

the problem is that this needs huge edits on UnitAI and some other components. so you need patience.

That would be huge. ^^ If you do get it working (whilst not breaking everything ;P ), please make a patch on Phab. Also, feel free to ping me on IRC (#0ad-dev on Quakenet) if you want to discuss something (even ping when I'm not online, I follow the logs quite regularly).

[alre]

On 13/11/2023 at 10:27 AM, man_s_our said:

I'm already working on this one (but the archer's firing speed and accuracy is what gets negative effect by movement speed. not the opposite) in other way.

the problem is that this needs huge edits on UnitAI and some other components. so you need patience.

I can help with UnitAI. could never make working animations though.

[man_s_our]

17 hours ago, alre said:

I can help with UnitAI. could never make working animations though.

if you want to help debugging and fixing the issues clone this repo and use this horse template for tests.

btw. I don't think we need animations because we're going to use infantry as turrets on horses.

 

fauna_horse.xml

Edited November 15, 2023 by man_s_our

[LienRag]

On 12/11/2023 at 8:25 AM, man_s_our said:

it doesn't add micros. but adds more tactical choices.

How so ?

If units don't see their back, it means that the player has to make them constantly turn around so they don't miss anything.

A real recipe for micromanagement disaster  in my book...