A new mod that combines RTS + other genre(s)

[Bosque]

Hello everyone,

First of all I'm from Spain so english isn't my native language and I'm also new in game development so I ask for patience, and I thank to the community for developing such a great game "for the people" instead of business.

I have a sugestion through, I see the game lags too badly and I know of an internal Blender engine called UPBGE, so I propose if the merging of the 0 A.D engine with another that is open source would be an option that could enlarge the posibilities of development.

As for the project that I have in mind:

- I ask permision to use the game assets (including another mods) for this.

- I will focus first of game mechanics and the rest (mainly art) later.

- More zoom levels so it would have better building/unit scale.

- It would be more casual (at least the battles), but have more other strategical mechanics.

- An initial palisade that covers the limit for all civs, spartans would have soldiers. Also it makes sense to make camp when attacking so all civs could build.

- Palisades and walls have height and blocks vision and projectiles.

- Buildings would have a guard, so capturing the building would be killing the guard (and the building becomes gaia) and the hero have to enter to enemy Civic Center (after gaia).

- It would be more "RPG mode", this means that it would be regicide mode and that the hero can see/explore the same radius of a city but that would be all the player could see. It emulates that the player is helpless if isolated.

- Hero can build Civic Center and camps (for free but takes long time, using resources to fast) and look for (recruit) new villagers (no citizen soldiers).

- Orders would be via buildings, hero need to be inside Civic Center to buid and player need storages to "order" to collect resouces.

- Gaia regenerates over time.

- Do you know the Widelands game? Because it will have some similiar mechanics like have to transport resources in the correct building. That includes that recruiting soldiers would need resources and villagers to "convert" to soldiers. And soldiers have to go to stables to ride on the horses.

- A building to produce wood, stone and metal like the orchad/farmland.

- Citizen soldiers "switch" the status in the forge. Ranged units would be very weak and could switch to melee.

- When leaving the city, it would be controled by IA but players won't know what happens. Hero can ask for resources and reinforcements from the IA.

- ¿Third person mode for hero?

- Buildings "grow up from the ground", I would like new models/animations in the contruction process.

- More "epic and superhuman" hero, that means that when he fights i would love to have these exagerated animations and collision.

I hope I don't forget anything but it's an ambitious project/mod and I won't lie: every help is apreciated, so for begin with: ¿how to mod?

Thanks for reading all of this.

[Langbart]

2 hours ago, Bosque said:

- I ask permision to use the game assets (including another mods) for this.

You just have to comply with the 0 A.D.'s licence(s). 0 A.D. is released as open source: you can freely use, copy, modify and distribute the game's source code and data files, as long as you include attribution to Wildfire Games and let anyone freely modify and distribute any of your own modifications to the game's files.

 For other mods you have to look at their licence(s) e.g. here is the licence for the 0abc-a24 mod on GitHub made by @Nescio.

2 hours ago, Bosque said:

so for begin with: ¿how to mod?

WIKI

There are some wiki articles you can read:

• wiki/Modding_Guide
• wiki/Mod_Layout
• wiki/ModdingGuiAndSimulation
• wiki/ArtDesignDocument

existing Mods

I also took a look at a small existing mod (e.g ffm_visibility mod or custom rating) to see how there mod is built. This helps to better understand how a mod is structured. Some total-conversion mods are: Hyrule Conquest, Delenda Est or 0AD City Builder.

IRC

Recently, there was a user in IRC #0ad-dev who asked the same question and @Stan` explained it to him, might be useful for you. Here is the link: 2021-01-29-QuakeNet (look for: "17:14 < nephele> Stan: staaaan, how to mod 0ad"). It might also be a good idea to join IRC (#0ad-dev) to discuss things more easily, most active devs are in the European timezone. 

Forum

There are some sub forums that might interest you e.g. Game Modification or Art Development.  If you encounter problems there are many people on these forums that can help. 

Edited March 11, 2021 by Langbart
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