===[TASK]=== Stables, Workshops, and Ranges

[LordGood]

I'm sure you guys know the drill by now

[Nescio]

Sorry, which one is which?

[Stan`]

3 minutes ago, Nescio said:

Sorry, which one is which?

All ranges so far.

[LordGood]

Spartan, Iberian, and Persian ranges. This is going to be the dump thread for the new building artwork.

[Lion.Kanzen]

Question romans have this? I mean will have?

Edited October 21, 2017 by Lion.Kanzen

[LordGood]

every playable faction is getting all 3. No shortcuts.

[LordGood]

The Persian texture pack is pretty neat

[LordGood]

Wish I had more Persian buildings to model lol, brings me back to playing Prince of Persia. Way better series than Assassin's creed imo, though I'm glad Ubisoft didn't run it too far into the ground. Lovely exaggerated Babylonian environments in TTT

I almost forgot that the Mauryans have no siege weapons at all. I suppose they will be our one exception then. Will you be moving to the Iberian workshop next @stanislas69?

[Lion.Kanzen]

2 minutes ago, LordGood said:

Wish I had more Persian buildings to model lol, brings me back to playing Prince of Persia. Way better series than Assassin's creed imo, though I'm glad Ubisoft didn't run it too far into the ground. Lovely exaggerated Babylonian environments in TTT

I almost forgot that the Mauryans have no siege weapons at all. I suppose they will be our one exception then. Will you be moving to the Iberian workshop next @stanislas69?

Indeed.

--------

in my opinión single color Persian...i don't like that.

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

33 minutes ago, LordGood said:

I almost forgot that the Mauryans have no siege weapons at all. I suppose they will be our one exception then. Will you be moving to the Iberian workshop next @stanislas69?

Mauryans were acquainted with siege technology at the time. There's no reason to not give them a catapult.

[LordGood]

[Lion.Kanzen]

25 minutes ago, LordGood said:

My goodness , now I need remade eEgyptian ones.

[Stan`]

@LordGood Sure thing. I need to get acquainted with Iberian siege engines and then stick to the footprint.

[Nescio]

9 hours ago, LordGood said:

Wish I had more Persian buildings to model lol

Feel free to design Persian elephant stables, chariot stables, camel stables, and military shipyard Anyway, I agree creating siege workshops for all other factions is more important.

9 hours ago, LordGood said:

I almost forgot that the Mauryans have no siege weapons at all.

That they currently don't have any doesn't mean they won't or shouldn't have any; those might be added eventually, therefore omitting a Mauryan siege workshop is a bad idea. In your own words:

14 hours ago, LordGood said:

every playable faction is getting all 3. No shortcuts.

Anyway, I'd like to emphasize I really appreciate your work.

[LordGood]

oh man i need sleep

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

I have wondered. Why do we throw pieces of wood and lumps of beige matter on top of the Iberian thatched roofs? lol Just wondering what that's all about.

 

I like the Persian stone tower. Just wish it was taller. I really like the layering you did with the decals on the eles stables.

Edited October 22, 2017 by wowgetoffyourcellphone

[LordGood]

Stones and branches provide weight to protect from winds and birds

[Grugnas]

i take the opportunity of this thread showing those new visual fancy additions to ask: what's gonna be fortress role after those new adds, supposed that specific units will be trained from dedicated buildings?

[Nescio]

Nice elephant stables, LordGood!

8 minutes ago, Grugnas said:

i take the opportunity of this thread showing those new visual fancy additions to ask: what's gonna be fortress role after those new adds, supposed that specific units will be trained from dedicated buildings?

What's the role of towers? They don't train units either, but they can shoot arrows and are garrisonable; likewise I think fortresses are still worth having even if they do not train anything at all. (Just because castles train units in AoK doesn't mean 0 A.D. has to slavishly copy that). However, it was not decided that all champions are to be removed from fortresses, at least not as far as I know.

[Grugnas]

That's a different concept.

Towers can be used to gain more vision or to provide discrete defense to own territory while under attack.

A fortress, despite its superior damage potential, is meant to give access to late game units like champions, sieges and heroes. Those units are the best respectively into damaging economy, damaging buildings, give utility bonus.

A fortress is easy to outflank and skip especially in open fields, often it isn't worth to have soldiers ( especially ranged units ) garrisoned in it as defensive decision. Having "ultimate" units (i am in favor of level 2 barracks tho) and perhaps "ultimate" technologies would highlight its importance.

EDIT: at same time, having those "ultimate" units elsewhere would put fortresses in a secondary scene.

Edited October 23, 2017 by Grugnas

[LordGood]

sentry tower give lightest, most spread out protection, defense towers are stronger defensive points for greater cost, easier to avoid due to the resource drain but harder to go up against when you're forced to. Fortresses are the next logical step, giving a lot more intense defensive capability in one area for a very high limiting cost. If towers were perfectly balanced we wouldn't need the minimum distance and build restrictions, and we'd see the same thing manifest in tower density. I'd personally make them territory roots, you can control a lot of land with a fortress, and generally speaking that's what they've always been for. In the countryside to extend your reach, or in a city to serve as a citadel so the whole city doesn't fall with the CC

[serveurix]

This is much better. The colored targets and the horses make the archery ranges and the stables easily recognisable at first glance. For the siege workshop it's harder, I guess the siege weapons could "stand out" a bit more.

[Grugnas]

2 hours ago, LordGood said:

I'd personally make them territory roots, you can control a lot of land with a fortress, and generally speaking that's what they've always been for. In the countryside to extend your reach, or in a city to serve as a citadel so the whole city doesn't fall with the CC

a non root (otherwise it would even outperform even civic center despite their bigger influence radius in terms of expansion, thus not defensive at all) fortress with high weight (in order to capture nearby neutral/enemy buildings) and, eventually:

technologies affecting buildings armor/hp

able to increase nearby buildings capture points and nearby towers pierce damage while up

it may make sense.

Still not fully convince though

 

"stronger defensive points for greater cost, easier to avoid due to the resource drain but harder to go up against when you're forced to"

actually defense tower are the exact opposite of what you stated

[LordGood]

2 minutes ago, Grugnas said:

 

"stronger defensive points for greater cost, easier to avoid due to the resource drain but harder to go up against when you're forced to"

actually defense tower are the exact opposite of what you stated

 

2 hours ago, LordGood said:

sentry tower give lightest, most spread out protection, defense towers are stronger defensive points for greater cost, easier to avoid due to the resource drain but harder to go up against when you're forced to.

can't go cutting clauses out of sentences and expect them to retain their original meaning, silly

I don't like how quickly cities fall once the administrative center (which is generally hard to fortify without planning for it at the start of the game) falls. "rush the CC" is mindless and effective in that it cripples the whole city. Better to make an attacking army fight the strongest points in the city before it falls

[Grugnas]

1 hour ago, LordGood said:

 

can't go cutting clauses out of sentences and expect them to retain their original meaning, silly

Indeed something that compared to another may appear good, they aren't that superior after all... both are quite easy to "skip".

Defense Tower issues:

• fire can't focus or be redirected to fire at a given zone ( something that perhaps would be really interesting to have on archers in order to let them shoot at an area).
• don't prioritize ranged units over melee units ( If i want units or buildings to hit melee units, i'd rather ungarrison all my skirmishers since they deal much more damage ).
• elephants destroy towers with ease while absorbing all the damage.  ( would be nice to have spiked walls as extra defense against elephants, perhaps with a % of reflected damage or a nearby enemies damaging rectangle shaped aura )
• They perform well only against a small group of infantry units.
• Imho the build restriction distance is too high for their performance.
• they don't even deal a scratch to "in range 20 or more ranged cavalry".
• champions can capture a full hp garrisoned tower ( that's kinda lame ).
• i am not sure why women can garrison towers when the town bell rings... it basically prevents men from using them.

As you can see, towers have more disadvantages than advantages.

Quote

I don't like how quickly cities fall once the administrative center (which is generally hard to fortify without planning for it at the start of the game) falls. "rush the CC" is mindless and effective in that it cripples the whole city. Better to make an attacking army fight the strongest points in the city before it falls

I don't like to crush 10 fortresses to defeat a player, because the time spent into hunting fortress, that player could have expanded elsewhere or just rebuild the whole army ( especially if all units are trainable from other than fortress buildings ).

If you let the enemies reach your city kernel and destroy it at first attempt, perhaps you deserve to lose if you have no backup.

Indeed a civic center is harder to reach if protected by walls, also that "CC rush" doesn't work in team games as long it has been discouraged in previous alpha.

Indeed fortress should provide strategic defense where most needed. As i just proposed on the last post, if fortresses could increase capture points ( or whatever defense-like bonus ) of nearby buildings, they could have a tactical advantage into protect crucial buildings from capturing like barracks.