Stella Artis Mod - A OSS Fast RTS

[Stan`]

I'm creating this thread to discuss how to make the mod stella artis : https://github.com/0ADMods/stella_artis/

Ground Rules:

• It must play like StarCraft
• Three factions only
• Must be set in a futuristic (sci-fi) timeframe
• Two resources

 

TODO:

• Find the names for all three civs
• Create the 3 civs.json
• Create the templates for all units and buildings
• Create the techs, auras and whatnot
• Define the building footprints for all civs (ex 4x4 5x5 2x2.. etc) so placeholder buildings can be used

 

 

@Lion.Kanzen

 

[Lion.Kanzen]

Brainstorming the  Human race...

In the original SC they create cowboys in the space.

Which name can represent Terran or we the earthlings?

[Nescio]

Before you can start writing templates (which is easy), you first need to decide how many and which phases, resources, and damage types you want to have, next what kind of unit types, and then what structures you'll need for that.

Also, is this to be a mod based on some other game or is it to be created from scratch? If you just want pronounceable alien-sounding names, here are a couple three-letter ones: Zaq, Wer, Yui (just typing adjacent keys ).

[Stan`]

3 hours ago, Lion.Kanzen said:

Which name can represent Terran or we the earthlings?

I liked the one you proposed. It'd also be convient if it could be shortened, etc, athen spart ptol

 

2 hours ago, Nescio said:

Before you can start writing templates (which is easy), you first need to decide how many and which phases, resources, and damage types you want to have, next what kind of unit types, and then what structures you'll need for that.

Two resources, the rest can be copied from startcraft

2 hours ago, Nescio said:

Also, is this to be a mod based on some other game or is it to be created from scratch?

A bit of both, I want to reuse mechanics that works so I can offer an alternative to starcraft

Spoiler

If you just want pronounceable alien-sounding names, here are a couple three-letter ones: Zaq, Wer, Yui (just typing adjacent keys ).

Nice thanks

[av93]

Maybe names could be found after a incial design?:

Terran are human (we), adaptative, mechanical, cowboys in the space, with autoritarian dictatorships, but also freedom fighters (even terrorist)

Protoss are tech aliens, hit hard but fewr and expensive, saviours but sometimes racist and apply genocide, mix of native american and orientalism. Rounded shapes

Zerg are the very bad mindless guys, win by swarming and even suicide units. They want to consume everything, but no individual will, organic shapes. "Revolutionary" tech tree were larva morph intro structures or units, that can even morph more

Tvtroopes is a good places to brainstorm stereotypes

Edited December 6, 2019 by av93

[Lion.Kanzen]

I will combinated several sci fi fiction stories.

is the year 10000 A.D (?) the humans are disperse over many high distances over universe., but they dont reach center of this universe...

The United Nations becomes a kind of Republic, very old republic, earth was abandoned around 2,492 A.D after evacated the last remain of humans, those survived the last Galactic War.

No Inteligent alien life yet until...

 

Protoss live in other reality, in peace , they dont know about violence, or being greed or about malice until they contacted with Humans.

They feels about helping the humans but... Their innocence was too much they crossed to observe us then this universe is corrupted by every single cell, atom...

Protoss are the Utopia, Humans are Balance , Zerg are Souless pure animal , without moral, pure evolve.

[av93]

57 minutes ago, Lion.Kanzen said:

Protoss live in other reality, in peace , they dont know about violence, or being greed or about malice until they contacted with Humans.

https://starcraft.fandom.com/wiki/Protoss_Civil_War
IRC, there's a conflict between Tassadar helping and being curious about humans, and Aldaris that don't give a nut and he doesn't care about "purify" all life in the infested planets.

I supose that the interesting thing about the last discussion, it's how every faction can have it's shades, giving a more complex factions, instead of the bad vs good guys. Heart of the Swarm kind of try to give it a light/grey shade to the zergs, the ones that lacked colour in the original Starcraft. from a gameplay pov, that also justify conflict inside factions.

Star Wars also kind of done this between the new films and the original movies. Seems a general direction of the narrative in the last years

[Thorfinn the Shallow Minded]

Thoughts on buildings: it would be nice for them to move.  I see one faction as a nomadic one that is used to exploiting the resources on a planet and then leaving.  One of their strengths could be fast but inefficient collection of resources.  Their buildings can move, maintaining things like unit production during that time, but if they are idle they can move significantly faster.  Some structures could perhaps be even considered more like self-propelled artillery.  A huge downside could be a hard cap on how many of each type of structure they could make.  Probably they could have a variety of means of transporting troops such as a quick air transport.  They would be probably the best faction when it comes to raiding and choosing fights well.  

Another one could perhaps emphasise buildings that tend to be stationary, but for a nominal cost, they could be teleported to a different location.  Their units could be built around providing a variety of bonuses to each other such as movement speed and improved range, making various unit combinations and positioning crucial to effective play-styles.  

A last faction could maybe have free buildings.  These would emerge from the ground usually at a slow rate.  The general downside is that typically only a finite number of buildings can be built simultaneously.  Perhaps the structures could also have lower hp than others but on the other hand benefit from regenerating hp and some providing healing to surrounding units.  Most of their units would tend to be slow, but there could also be faster ones that lose hp at a steady rate.  Basically I'm thinking something like space ents. 

If any of these sound cool, I could try fleshing them out.  

[Stan`]

2 hours ago, Lion.Kanzen said:

is the year 10000 A.D (?) t

Could be or 42 k cause you know  42

@Thorfinn the Shallow Minded I'm not against some brainstorming as long as it stays a starcraft alternative, which also has moving buildings

[Rolf Dew]

Perhaps the Zerg like faction could take some inspiration from Wasps, Ants or even Termite to a degree.

Maybe the terrans could be like modern day colonialist mixed with futuristic military, perhaps some inspiration from the US, Spanish in South America and other colonies.

Finally maybe the Protoss like faction could take some inspiration from futuristic tech mixed with physic abilities.

 

 

[Stan`]

I'm open really

[av93]

If you want more inspiration from a lore pov, Civ Beyond Earth have also nice ideas to the question, how the humanity would adapt to the future in a new colonized planet:

-"Stay human" civ: bio and mechanical tech to enhace the humanity, but clearly separated. Adapt and change the environtment
(Terran)

Ethos: Human problems, in the space. Dictatorship, corruption, but also freedom fighters, in the space.
Gameplay: Standart. Adaptability.

- "Cyborg" civ: replace every possible part of the human body by tech to bypass biological limitations. Adapt the environment to humanity and to a computational net.
(Protoss).

Ethos: Efficiency and egalitarian by the mathematic decisions, but the inflexibility can bring unappealable bold decisions
Gameplay: Expensive, Hit hard.

- "Gaia" civ: chage the biology of the humanity to match the environment and to perfect itself. (Zerg)
Ethos: playing with bioengeenering makes them defenders of life and environment, but also egocentric mind that plays to be God, sacrificing lives  contradictorily without caring at all.

[Stan`]

Sounds good. I wonder if that could be drafted in the github wiki. I'd like everyone to contribute

[Lion.Kanzen]

I don't want it to be the same Starcraft story.

At least the origin.
Humans roam the universe for different reasons.

The dictatorship could be good if the leader does not seek absolute power, just as the defenders of the oppressed could simply be anarchists.

Let's add this as an ingredient of the human being out of curiosity, and to know secrets, as well as unconscionable and unethical scientific ambition.

All this gives a cocktail of different alliances and enmities between them, as well as conspiracies and a couple of human faction that deviated from the route in their journey through the universe.

Humans create (zerg) with his unnethical experiments, similar to Virus and biological weapons in resident evil.

Humans are trying to reach center of universe but they need reach the other side opposite to old solar system where the earth was devastated. 

Edited December 6, 2019 by Lion.Kanzen

[Stan`]

Would be nice to have the three faction names so we can come up with wiki pages and advance development.

[Alexandermb]

From artist view: Define first what are the mechanism/motion of the factions engines such as aircrafts, tanks, morphological build of the entities.

IE: Following Warhammer 40k; 

Tau: Have squared levitating tanks and armorships wich also are squared but behave as an Exo-Skeleton firing and moving.

Spoiler

Eldars: Very different from Tau having soften edges on tanks and Tall machines wich are clearly controled by itself or by another kind of entity whitout crew.

Spoiler

So from a Starcraft view this would be Tau - Terran / Eldar - Protoss.

Very important to avoid having mixed designs between factions.

[Stan`]

I submitted a patch to improve flying behavior to allow for flying units without them circling in the sky.

 

[av93]

Art style from Beyond Earth, the three affinities:

 

Spoiler

 

[Lion.Kanzen]

Spoiler

Infantry looks nice.

[Stan`]

Interesting. I made a unit you can check it out in the mod. Maybe it can be reused.

[Thorfinn the Shallow Minded]

Here's a clearer outline of one of the factions I proposed:

Placeholder Name: Nomads (or Horde)

Lore: Earth gradually dwindled itself of resources, and humanity had to leave, but all attempts to terraform planets proved expensive and resulted in failure.  Instead, the people who survived of the human race did so through intense genetic engineering.  Now they roam from planet to planet, taking the resources before finding a new target.  The few that remain unaltered humans are the elite, commanding their thralls from the comfort of small habitats suitable for the true remnants of the human race.  

Bonuses:

Nomadic: All buildings are mobile, but there are limits to how many can be built.  Training units and researching technology can still be done in a moving structure at the cost of increased time.  

Scavengers: Resources are gathered faster but are diminished at an even faster rate.  

Units and Buildings:

Cloning Facility: Produces Workers.    

Worker: Primary economic unit.  Collects resources faster than others.

Barracks: Produces Scavenger and Grunt.  Most weapon upgrades available here.  

Scavenger: Infantry unit that is able to gather resources like the worker but at a much slower rate.  Good cannon-fodder.

Grunt: Infantry reinforced with an exoskeleton.  Slower than Scavenger but much beefier.  

Recon Centre: Produces Angel, Scout, and Dragoon.  Requires Genetic Engineering Lab and Barracks.

Angel: Fast unit capable of flying short distances.  

Scout: Unit capable of camouflaging.  Has a strong sneak attack that reveals it.  Slower when cloaked.  

Dragoon: Cavalry unit that is fastest unit available to the Nomads.  Possibly can attack while moving.

Emplacement: Self-propelled artillery battery that can also train Sappers.

Sapper: Suicide unit does explosion damage when attacking.  

Genetic Engineering Lab: Area where most technologies that unlock units and provide improvements to existent traits of units.

Glider: Unit that can be built that transports units.  Not a fast unit, but one that allows for creative attack angles.  

 

That's a general template of what I've got.  One of the reasons I would say there is some merit to this race is that it would allow for a Starcraft-like faction to exist without just a copy-and-paste of Terran, Protoss, and Zerg.  I tried to make for some interesting mechanics that fit with the thematic picture I'm also trying to portray. 

[Rolf Dew]

What if the Protoss like race were once peaceful pacifist beings with no plans for expansion, then they create a super ai that slowly starts taking over their minds and alters and upgrades their bodies and abilities.

Maybe this can be how they get their superhuman reflexes, cloaking and other things.

The ai's ultimate goal is to ensure the survival of the Machina race, as this was what it was created for.

Perhaps if a campaign happens, then there can be groups of their race that shun the ai and others that embrace it or think they can control it.

Possible faction Roster

Possible name (The Machina Miles - latin for machine soldiers)

Bonus: all units can repair themselves very slowly.

Cons: Most units are vulnerable to EMP damage.

 

Units and buildings:

 

Supercomputer: Produces tech workers and protectors.

Tech workers: fast moving worker this unit is vulnerable to raids but explodes upon death causing units around it to take damage.

Protectors: Cheap cannon fodder units, they are small robots with lasers.

 

Factory: Produces Cyborgs and Laser shooter.

Cyborgs: Augumented units, that can cloak and dodge damage occasionaly, only capable of melee attacks and periodic shock attacks.

Laser shooter: units fitted with light laser weapons, is very fast but fragile, good against air units and as a general ranged unit, pretty accurate due to its ai targeting system, can dodge damage.

 

Machine factory: produces airdroids and sensors.

Airdroids: Fast lightly armored flying Droids, especially good in large numbers, fragile but deal good damage.

Sensors: can take control of an enemy non organic unit, causing the enemy unit to self destruct and sense cloaked units in it's radius, rather expensive but powerful, can cloak for a short while.

 

Transport facility: trains heavy transports and ion ships.

Heavy transports: a slow heavily armored ship with limited attack capabilites, can transport units.

Ion ships: medium speed ship that uses a laser cannon attached beneath it, very effective against ground units but vulnerable to air units as it cannot attack air units.

Most of their units will be expensive compared to the two other races.

 

Edited December 7, 2019 by Rolf Dew

[Stan`]

Thanks keep it coming. One thing though it would be nice to avoid to need extra features as much as possible because it makes the mod maintenance harder :/

[Stan`]

I started adding buildings matching the starcraft ones to see how it goes. All my footprints are wrong since all starcraft buildings are for an unknown reason all shifted 45degrees...

Currently civ center cube is 5x5 dunno if it should be 4x4

Couldn't find a way to remove all resources to keep only two, so for now only wood and food are used.

Still need a proper vcs replacement, and a name for that.

Couldn't find a way to add building dependencies.

Supply depot still has territory while it shouldn't

Still no civ.json

Help is welcome

[Nescio]

4 minutes ago, Stan` said:

Couldn't find a way to remove all resources to keep only two, so for now only wood and food are used.

Removing is more work than adding, though it shouldn't be too difficult per se. Basically you have to remove all occurrences of the resource types you don't want to have. Try starting with the following:

gui/common/setup_resources.xml
gui/text/tips.DELETED
simulation/data/auras.DELETED
simulation/data/cheats.DELETED
simulation/data/civs.DELETED
simulation/data/resources.DELETED
simulation/data/resources/one.json
simulation/data/resources/other.json
simulation/data/technologies.DELETED
simulation/templates.DELETED