why alpha 24 is not nice ?

[Genava55]

12 minutes ago, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

I believe the Iberians were to be the quintessential defensive civ. Hiding behind their walled settlements sending out raiding parties and wearing down their opponents that way. Along with ambushing/guerrilla warfare, the Iberians would be rather unique in this way.

The problem is that those justifications are probably incorrect from a historical point of view.

 

Edited March 1, 2021 by Genava55

[Sundiata]

Just now, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

I believe the Iberians were to be the quintessential defensive civ. Hiding behind their walled settlements sending out raiding parties and wearing down their opponents that way. Along with ambushing/guerrilla warfare, the Iberians would be rather unique in this way. But as development progressed this kind of thinking fell by the wayside, culminating now in what we have in A24.

Just now, Genava55 said:

Probably a reference to the Bronze Age culture "El Argar", suspected to be the ancestor of the Iron Age Iberian culture.

I'm really still not seeing it. But anyway, obviously the decision isn't up to me. Just sharing my viewpoint on the matter. 

As I said, giving them a stable from the start would be historically justified, and is a significant civ-bonus in its own right, without being so intrusive as walls. 

[Stan`]

27 minutes ago, Sundiata said:

Iberians were particularly associated with quality horses and even had an important dedicated horse sanctuary, so maybe let them start with a stable? That would be a good example of a significant civ-specific bonus rooted in history.

Could be done, but needs a hell of change

39 minutes ago, Sundiata said:

Wait... So they're invisible walls??

You'll see them in Atlas (Note it should work way better on macOS now)

 

 

[av93]

The walls were given because they usually did fortifications on hills (like a lot of cultures, btw)

"The guerrilla warfare" (associated to Spain in Napoleon times, where the name came from the spanish) was more a Lusitanian thing. Iberians tactics weren't so different from spear walls.

Also the sling thing it's more a feature from Balearic Islands, that were'nt connected to Iberians by any kingdom or Empire

Before redesigning the uniqueness of civilizations, make a table and think collectively instead of adding and deleting design quirks individually on every civ.

I would give the guerrilla/ambushing features to Britons.

Edited March 1, 2021 by av93

[Genava55]

35 minutes ago, Sundiata said:

I'm really still not seeing it.

I suspect the El Argar origin but I am not sure. I don't think anyone can retrieve the original justifications for this. Anyway, if it's this, this is really a double-standard and inconsistent. 

[Grapjas]

1 hour ago, Sundiata said:

Think of it as a placebo effect (a very strong and real psychological effect). Even today, some people still go to faith healers and claim they were cured of whatever. They can even make the cripples walk! Charlatans aside, clergy were often medical care givers, whether it was tending to the sick, or performing "miracles", people back then did believe in their power, and they did provide some care for the sick, so therefore it's a fair abstraction imo. Priests did often accompany armies..

I understand why priests are ingame, just saying the way it works is fantasy (and probably just a copied mechanic from AOE). The vast majority of those 'miracles' happened outside of combat if you even want to refer to such things. In regards to them being in armies, i suggested they buff the army rather than heal it because of their presence.

Anyway, temples cannot be build in neutral territories, the tents i was suggesting can. I won't deny that priests were actually assisting to take care of wounded/sick people, outside of combat.

But if we talk about warfare, you had 2 options: A:(tactical) Retreat to live and fight another day B: Fight till death
and not C: have some people waving hands and magically heal up soldiers while combat is going on. Come to think about it, it would be a decent solution if priests/healers/surgeons/druids could only heal people that are not actively fighting, but im not sure how hard/easy that is to implement.

Edited March 1, 2021 by Grapjas

[Genava55]

The original Iberians in 0ad seems to have been designed on purpose from both the Celtiberians and the Iberians. Maybe a unique gameplay mech should be to branch two civs with the Iberians and letting the player choose during the game at some point. This is not totally historical but if it is clear and transparent I don't see the issue. 

Besides this, I agree with @av93 remarks.

[Genava55]

7 minutes ago, Grapjas said:

I understand why priests are ingame, just saying the way it works is fantasy (and probably just a copied mechanic from AOE). The vast majority of those 'miracles' happened outside of combat if you even want to refer to such things. In regards to them being in armies, i suggested they buff the army rather than heal it because of their presence.

Anyway, temples cannot be build in neutral territories, the tents i was suggesting can. I won't deny that priests were actually assisting to take care of wounded/sick people, outside of combat.

But if we talk about warfare, you had 2 options: A:(tactical) Retreat to live and fight another day B: Fight till death
and not C: have some people waving hands and magically heal up soldiers while combat is going on. Come to think about it, it would be a decent solution if priests/healers/surgeons/druids could only heal people that are not actively fighting, but im not sure how hard/easy that is to implement.

To discuss further this priest issue I consider important as well, the copy from AoE2 is really an issue, I agree on this matter. Maybe the game should include a whole system related to priests and religion. Maybe a system of rituals enabled in a temple to give a specific bonus or anything else. But really, the priest and religion are wasted aspects.

Edit: if I recall, Ancestors legacy had some tech bonus related to religion, it was really basic although.

Edited March 1, 2021 by Genava55

[wraitii]

I had a diff to make use 'field hospitals' in the long lost past.

The big problem with 'healing' is that wounded units should really lose fighting capability for it to make sense. At that point, the whole RTS abstraction we're using breaks down.

[Grapjas]

13 minutes ago, wraitii said:

wounded units should really lose fighting capability for it to make sense.

I much like this idea tbh. Sounds like something i would add to my mod. Gonna give it a shot. Along with buildable tents in neutral territory and replace the priest/surgeon/healer mechanic.

[hyperion]

46 minutes ago, Sundiata said:

Fortresses weren't usually recruitment places and siege equipment was usually made on the site of a siege, or prefabricated at some dedicated workshops or camps in some instances if I'm not mistaken. These things might not be totally out of place for the Romans, but don't really apply to anyone else to my knowledge. 

Yes I agree that the most logical place to produce sieges would be the Roman army camp which is placed in enemy territory. But that one can't produce them any longer either.

[Nescio]

Perhaps someone should split this conversation.

1 hour ago, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

I believe the Iberians were to be the quintessential defensive civ.

Aren't the Carthaginians supposed to be that? Their walls have 3× the health walls of other factions have.

1 hour ago, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

Hiding behind their walled settlements sending out raiding parties and wearing down their opponents that way. Along with ambushing/guerrilla warfare, the Iberians would be rather unique in this way.

Ambushing and guerrilla tactics were not unique to the Iberians. Moreover, they're typically conducted by those who didn't have heavily fortified urban centres to fall back to.

As already pointed out by others, the Iberians in 0 A.D. are a combination of different things, both various ancient peoples (Lusitanians, Celtiberians, Iberians, Balearics), as well as some 19th and 20th C notions; the original designer even argued they should speak modern Spanish in game, not Basque (see this post). 0 A.D. is not exactly the same game as it was a decade or two ago, or even an alpha or two ago; things evolve over time and that's perfectly fine. That doesn't mean we should throw away everything, just that nothing is sacrosanct: a critical attitude is healthy, both towards new proposals and towards what's already present in game.

[Nescio]

43 minutes ago, hyperion said:

Yes I agree that the most logical place to produce sieges would be the Roman army camp which is placed in enemy territory. But that one can't produce them any longer either.

Perhaps we should make a distinction between siegecraft and artillery. Artillery was used by both the besiegers and the besieged, as well as in naval warfare. Arsenals (i.e. places for producing, storing, and mantaining artillery) are well-attested, many urban centres had them. Siegecraft (ladders, rams, towers, etc.), on the other hand, was very much constructed on the spot.

The Romans were great at besieging and constructing siegecraft, however, they tended to rely on their Greek allies to provide the artillery. The first known usage of artillery by the Romans themselves was during the Second Punic War, after they seized the large arsenals of Syracusae and Carthago Nova. Nevertheless, artillery was only included in Roman legions by Caesar, who experienced having a battery of scorpion(e)s coud give a clear advantage on the battefield, and became a fixture of Roman legions (and army camps) in imperial times, in contrast to the Republican period (0 A.D.'s timeframe).

I'd be fine with returning siege rams to the army camp and perhaps moving them from the arsenal to the forge as well, removing arsenals for factions that only have rams. However, I don't think army camps should be able to produce artillery.

If I recall correctly, Stronghold had trainable siege engineers who could construct and man siegecraft (ladders, mantlets, rams, etc.). Such a thing would be really nice to have in 0 A.D. (rams as “movable structures”).

[hyperion]

29 minutes ago, Nescio said:

I'd be fine with returning siege rams to the army camp and perhaps moving them from the arsenal to the forge as well, removing arsenals for factions that only have rams. However, I don't think army camps should be able to produce artillery.

I have no strong opinion on whether Roman camp should produce sieges or not, all I'm saying is only game play should matter in such a decision on not history/realism. As for the free houses, it's a shame, this is a real unique trait gone with no replacement in sight.

[mysticjim]

Is it worth taking a snapshot poll of feelings towards A24 vs A23 now, and then again in a couple of months? 

I think my biggest worry is going to be if there is a gradual acceptance of things that are problems and a growing tendency to imply they'll be 'fixed' in A25. If a sizable chunk of the community simply find the game less fun right now, for whatever reason, their patience will be very short.

And I don't think it's fair to tell people who claim to prefer A23 to simply go back and play that. They won't, they will drop 0AD altogether, like a stone - without looking back. There is a plethora of choice available in this genre, plenty of it cheap - if not quite free like 0AD. I'd be worried if the overriding trend is that A24 makes people less likely to enjoy playing 0AD - I wouldn't be telling them to go elsewhere. Probably because they will! 

I'm still getting to grips with A24 having not had anywhere near enough time to play with it, so far my only gripes have been the sounds (previously mentioned) and the slight shrinking of the icons (speaking from an accessibility point of view as someone with awful eyesight!). I've yet to encounter the balancing properly, but hope to see that first hand in my first few A24 team games. And until mods are working, specifically the Spec/Monitor mod, I'm not in a position to do commentary videos on other peoples games. I'm waiting to see if that sense of drama and action has changed negatively or been lost somewhat. If it has, if the I find myself getting bored commentating on an A24 game, then I'd say the whole project was in a bit of bother and it wouldn't bode well. Naturally, I hope that won't be the case, of course  

[borg-]

The biggest proof that a24 is better than a23, is to join a team game and see at least 6 different civilizations, where before we only had two haha

[andy5995]

1 hour ago, mysticjim said:

and the slight shrinking of the icons (speaking from an accessibility point of view as someone with awful eyesight!).

@mysticjimIn your user.cfg file, you can add `gui.scale = "1.25"` to increase the size of everything, including the icons.

Edited March 1, 2021 by andy5995

[mysticjim]

1 hour ago, andy5995 said:

@mysticjimIn your user.cfg file, you can add `gui.scale = "1.25"` to increase the size of everything, including the icons.

Brilliant, mate, I'll give that a go. 

[nani]

Just deleted all my houses due to click lag.
Also:

• Double click now select houses and houses placements making it even more prone do accidentally delete all your houses.
• Now double click select selects all the houses no matter the civ type, so if you double click some enemy captured houses it can also select yours and delete them. This was also a problem with same civ before but now it affect always

[Stan`]

Click lag?! @wraitii
another SDL bug?

[nani]

When I say lag = combination of stutter + ping lag + interface update slow

I use alot the hotkeys and click alot so I can reach 4 to 5 diferent action per second, with a23 I could somewhat do it but with a24 I have to double/triple check the units so they do what I tell them to do as I don't have immediate visual feedback to if command was done.

Edited March 1, 2021 by nani
typos everywhere

[nani]

Also due to many times having multiple hotkeys with same key (but one with ctrl, shift, space) get called one after the other, very annoying

[badosu]

3 hours ago, mysticjim said:

And until mods are working, specifically the Spec/Monitor mod, I'm not in a position to do commentary videos on other peoples games.

Sorry, I just have not had the time lately, will prioritize this as soon as I can. And I'm glad you find it useful.

[wraitii]

12 minutes ago, nani said:

I use alot the hotkeys and click alot so I can reach 4 to 5 diferent action per second, with a23 I could somewhat do it but with a24 I have to double/triple check the untis do what I tell them as I don't immediate visual feedback that what I commanded was done.

Can you clarify? We didn't change anything in terms of command delay, so I don't understand why you experience 'slower' visual feedback on A24.

11 minutes ago, nani said:

Also due to many times having multiple hotkeys with same key (but one with ctrl, shift, space) get called one after the other, very annoying

Can you also explain this further?

22 minutes ago, nani said:

• Double click now select houses and houses placements making it even more prone do accidentally delete all your houses.
• Now double click select selects all the houses no matter the civ type, so if you double click some enemy captured houses it can also select yours and delete them. This was also a problem with same civ before but now it affect always

Those are arguably usability improvements: you double-click to select all houses, it selects all houses. IIRC triple-click will select only the same entity.
I'm not sure if that's a hotkey or if you'll have to mod it to change the behaviour. Maybe we could add another option for this, but I would call that a https://xkcd.com/1172/ issue.

3 hours ago, mysticjim said:

I think my biggest worry is going to be if there is a gradual acceptance of things that are problems and a growing tendency to imply they'll be 'fixed' in A25.

You write 'fixed' but issues will actually be fixed, I don't know why you'd assume that we'll just pretend to fix things.

 

[Imarok]

On 28/02/2021 at 3:08 PM, Sundiata said:

architect elephants (elephants building)

I know I'm totally irrational about this, but I loved watching the elephants putting wooden beams on buildings with their trunks.