Let's Fight - Gameplay Balance Mod

[alre]

@borg- and what about skirmisher infantry?

[Player of 0AD]

I think that the system melee > cav > ranged > melee is not desirable, and it does not fit to the game.

For example swordsmen are not too great against cav, especially ranged cav. That's okay.

It should also be possible to counter some ranged units with some melee units for diversity. In A23 swordsmen were not too bad against archers, that's fine - should archers only be counterable by cav? No, because you can't run all your eco only by cav.

Also, keep ranged cav in mind, it is cav and ranged. It is okay if it is not too great against other ranged units, which are supposed to be weak against cav in the mentioned system...

And so forth...

 

[hyperion]

6 minutes ago, Nescio said:

I can't say I like the hard limit of only 3 fortresses and 10 towers

Seconded. Any number limits except for heroes and wonder, which could be labelled natural, I'd rather see removed entirely.

[Dakara]

I LIKE LIBERTY! build fort with center civic please

[faction02]

7 hours ago, maroder said:

I hate being told what to do or not to do

I won't disagree with you on this particular point.   However, computer performances are telling you that you have to limit the maximum population in a game!! 

If you first reach the maximum population and start investing resources into turtling, then turtling doesn't really have an economic cost. Waiting for resources exhaustion is far from fun for me, I could make tea the first 2 minutes but then what should I do???   

 

Turtling is a bit too effective in 0ad: you can repair buildings for free, with trade, resources might be infinite and there is only a fixed cost to defensive structure. I would find defensive buildings less problematic if they were taking some population space for example. If 1 tower takes 1 population space (corresponding to the default arrow of that tower), then you might think twice about the number of towers you want to add to your unconquerable city since you will have 1 less citizen worker on your economy.

This would be a bit different than what is suggesting @Radiotraining since the penalty cost would mostly affect a player that has reached his population limit and refuse to engage in a fight rather than a player actually defending his base.  

We probably all agree with your ideal of having incentives rather than rules. The minimum distance restrictions is for me more like a temporary fix to make the overall balancing of the game a much easier problem rather than a perfect solution. It seems really difficult to design a good mechanics to discourage too much turtling without making balancing other part of the game really difficult.

 

P.S. if you enjoy building unconquerable city, you should try playing games with a population limit of 50. Defensive buildings become much more effective  

[maroder]

1 hour ago, faction02 said:

If you first reach the maximum population and start investing resources into turtling, then turtling doesn't really have an economic cost. Waiting for resources exhaustion is far from fun for me, I could make tea the first 2 minutes but then what should I do???

but jokes aside

1 hour ago, faction02 said:

Turtling is a bit too effective in 0ad

Yes, true. But as you said that is mainly a problem in the late game / stalemate situation.

My point of view: In the early game there should be the three classic rock paper scissors strategies: Boom, Rush and Turtle, which cancel each other out. So If you think your opponent will rush, it should be a valid strategy to turtle, to counter that. If he instead booms, well sucks to be you, now you have spend resources for nothing.

1 hour ago, faction02 said:

We probably all agree with your ideal of having incentives rather than rules.

Good to hear, thats my main point. So instead of setting a minimum distance or nerfing of defensive structure in general (which hurts turteling as a strategy in the early game) I would much rather prefer your suggestion that defensive structure (maybe not the sentry tower) cost population space or @Radiotraining suggestion. Additionally also stronger siege. This would be a penalty for late game turteling, without making it useless in the early game.

 

1 hour ago, faction02 said:

P.S. if you enjoy building unconquerable city, you should try playing games with a population limit of 50. Defensive buildings become much more effective  

thanks, I will try

Edited March 30, 2021 by maroder

[borg-]

5 hours ago, Player of 0AD said:

I think that the system melee > cav > ranged > melee is not desirable, and it does not fit to the game.

For example swordsmen are not too great against cav, especially ranged cav. That's okay.

Yes, it is my preferred system, but it cannot be applied to 0 a.d.

For 0 a.d I would use only necessary counter.

How I think balancing for the future:

Melee infantry with the same movement speed as ranged. This would already significantly help melee units to be more effective.

Javelin cav/inf - It must be a unit with extremely high damage, but very vulnerable, changes that I would make: Range 30 > 24, Pierce Attack 16 > 20, Pierce amor 1 > 3.

This makes them very strong with some melee unit in front, but the cavalry and also the melee infantry are more vulnerable if they are without a meat shield. It also makes it more durable against archers.

Slinger - No changes.

Archer cav/inf - Decrease accuracy 2.0 > 2.5.

Spearmen inf - Should be more effect in battles. Pierce attack 2.5 > 3.0.

Swordmen - Must be lethal when reaching your enemy, but more vulnerable to projectiles. Increase Hack Attack 5.5 > 6.5, decrease Pierce Attack 5 > 3.

Pikemen - it must be very effective against melee infantry and cavalry, but very weak against ranged units. Increase Hack/Pierce Attack to 3.5, Hack Armor 10 > 8 and decrease Pierce 10 > 5.

Spear cav - No changes.

Sword cav - Bonus 1.25 vs ranged infantry.

[Thorfinn the Shallow Minded]

21 minutes ago, borg- said:

Must be lethal when reaching your enemy, but more vulnerable to projectiles. Increase Hack Attack 5.5 > 6.5, decrease Pierce Attack 5 > 3.

Honestly I could see the swordsman being purposed as an all-rounder, having a lot of pierce armour but lacking some of the ability to properly chase.  

Another change I would like to see is reducing line of sight, making it lower than even the maximum range of archers or slingers so that having a screen of units in front would be necessary to maximise the potential of the ranged units.

[faction02]

1 hour ago, maroder said:

but jokes aside

Unfortunately, I would say RIP catapults, you will not be needed in a24. Mass archers are doing a good job at countering you (especially if they are not supported by archers).

Yes, I was mostly talking about late game turtling indeed, I have nothing against early game turtling as you define it. I should have been more clear about the definition of the problem.  

I am currently watching a nice game illustrating the problem (I missed the money shoot, the red rams just destroyed a cc next to the fort at the front that was built next to it and lot of fpre palisades art was already destroyed ).

If I try to schematize the gameplay I have observed in this example:

Step 1: choose a civilization with archers tradition for op range

Step2: build towers/fort + anything that will prevent sieges from moving forward (palisades are great since you can put many layers in a tiny space).

Step3: wait for the enemy, he will need about 6 sieges to do something with his push* (meaning that he has 18 soldiers less on eco or fighting).Your soldiers should be able to handle easily the enemy army with the help of towers/forts. Once this is done, you can take care of the sieges that might have only be finishing to destroy the fifth layers of palisades if you have done a good job with your palisades.

 I can also spoil the end of this particular game for you but I assume you can easily guess . 

Spoiler

At minute 45, rorrosaar(1511) said he had been afk for a while, the game was lagging, he resigned and left without any clear winning team.

The minimum distance trick would only have move the fort at the front somewhere else since it was next to a cc, and the one at the upper right. I would therefore admit that it doesn't really address the main issues that are illustrated in this screenshot.

*I would guess 6 is a good average observation. You need to make quite a lot of damage to destroy the enemy defenses fast and since you need to mobilize your army to protect the sieges the opportunity cost of making a slow push is high. 6 rams or elephants allow to destroy palisades layers faster and spread them toward the many towers that you have to destroy while also allowing you to loose a few if needed.

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

7 hours ago, Player of 0AD said:

should archers only be counterable by cav? No, because you can't run all your eco only by cav.

The citizen soldier concept strikes again! 

[letsplay0ad]

@Nescio Thanks for catching that!

 

@maroder The base game has minimum distances between towers and civic centres to prevent abuse. The minimum fortress distance is in the same vein with the same logic. However, I do agree that a sort of "attrition" mechanic would be interesting, but I think it would be better suited for another mod since it's an entirely new mechanic.

 

@alre I'm with you now. That idea sounds pretty awesome for civilizations that have multiple choices of ranged units to allow them to choose between a "boom" or "defensive/preparing for war" strategy. The only concern I have with the "intermediate" type being applied to skirmishers is for civilizations like the Spartans that don't have an alternative ranged infantry unit. If I could figure how to reconcile that, I'd definitely try your idea.

 

@Radiotraining and @hyperion I agree that hard limits are undesirable. My original intention was to have the number of fortresses you could build be equal to the number of civic centres you had (ie: a castle for every city/village/town), but I couldn't get it to work.

 

@borg- I prefer the soft counter system, but if there's no alternative, then your suggestion is probably the way to go. The value changes proposed are also interesting. I'll look at those.

 

@Player of 0AD It's a soft counter system, so the system encourages you to do so and rewards you if you do follow it, but exceptions can be made if you have superior population, tactics, micromanagement, resources, technologies, etc. Also the goal is to reward diversity the most to allow for a variety of strategies and approaches over the "one-trick pony" tactics.

 

@Thorfinn the Shallow Minded That's a good idea. It would also encourage use of melee and cavalry units. I will look into that.

 

@faction02 Indeed. Some of the changes here are made with the intention to prevent that sort of abuse. The next step is testing and refining. Then making more changes as necessary, and repeat.

[borg-]

7 hours ago, Player of 0AD said:

It should also be possible to counter some ranged units with some melee units for diversity. In A23 swordsmen were not too bad against archers, that's fine - should archers only be counterable by cav? No, because you can't run all your eco only by cav.
 

Even if you give a bonus vs archer to javelin inf too, not every civilization has javelins, so it will never work. A decent counter system will only work if you remove the collection capacity from combat units. Yes, it is less real and changes the whole concept of the game, but I think it would be a step forward for a.d, because many of the changes are stopped because it also affects the economy.

[maroder]

Yes, sorry @letsplay0ad I was going off-topic for your mod and just expressing my thoughts as some of these ideas might find their way into the base game. But if you want to try a different concept to stop turteling, I think stronger siege, which can take down barriers faster, is nicer to play as more limits/ restrictions (even if that mechanic is already in the base game). @faction02 got a good point:

13 hours ago, faction02 said:

Unfortunately, I would say RIP catapults, you will not be needed in a24. Mass archers are doing a good job at countering you (especially if they are not supported by archers).

imo as long as they don't use fire arrows, they shouldn't really damage siege (except elephants).

[borg-]

28 minutes ago, maroder said:

imo as long as they don't use fire arrows, they shouldn't really damage siege (except elephants).

Why not? catapults were operated by people, don't necessarily attack a lot of wood and iron.

Anyway i think i will make a patch to increase the attack of the catapults and a little pierce resistance.

[maroder]

17 minutes ago, borg- said:

Why not? catapults were operated by people, 

Yes, but in reality they were much more static than in the game and would have had some shield or people shielding the people, to protect them from archers, if they were that close. Rams on the other hand who get really close and are usually in the range of arches, are especially build with a roof the protect the soldiers inside. That's why I think it would make sense to make siege vulnerable to close combat (swords/pike), but not to arrows (exec fire cav).

[alre]

Catapults weren't shielded against archers anymore than they were shielded against other assaulters, also, you can have people shielding the catapults in the game too.

In A24 catapults have 95% pierce resistance, it's a lot and I think it's more than enough. Also, we are going to have archers nerfed, and fortifications too, so please don't raise back catapults pierce resistance.

15 hours ago, borg- said:

Yes, it is my preferred system, but it cannot be applied to 0 a.d.

For 0 a.d I would use only necessary counter.

How I think balancing for the future:

Melee infantry with the same movement speed as ranged. This would already significantly help melee units to be more effective.

Javelin cav/inf - It must be a unit with extremely high damage, but very vulnerable, changes that I would make: Range 30 > 24, Pierce Attack 16 > 20, Pierce amor 1 > 3.

This makes them very strong with some melee unit in front, but the cavalry and also the melee infantry are more vulnerable if they are without a meat shield. It also makes it more durable against archers.

Slinger - No changes.

Archer cav/inf - Decrease accuracy 2.0 > 2.5.

Spearmen inf - Should be more effect in battles. Pierce attack 2.5 > 3.0.

Swordmen - Must be lethal when reaching your enemy, but more vulnerable to projectiles. Increase Hack Attack 5.5 > 6.5, decrease Pierce Attack 5 > 3.

Pikemen - it must be very effective against melee infantry and cavalry, but very weak against ranged units. Increase Hack/Pierce Attack to 3.5, Hack Armor 10 > 8 and decrease Pierce 10 > 5.

Spear cav - No changes.

Sword cav - Bonus 1.25 vs ranged infantry.

Personally, I like soft counters better than hard ones, but I'm not totally against them; what I'm against is counterintuitive and anti-historical mechanics: why would sword cavalry be better than spear cav against archers? I'm open to any argument of course.

Also, sword cav is already more useful as a ram counter (unfortunately so, I believe).

[borg-]

2 hours ago, alre said:

Personally, I like soft counters better than hard ones, but I'm not totally against them; what I'm against is counterintuitive and anti-historical mechanics: why would sword cavalry be better than spear cav against archers? I'm open to any argument of course.

Also, sword cav is already more useful as a ram counter (unfortunately so, I believe).

Basically any counter is historically wrong. historically javelin / spear / sword cavalry are the same unit, just like javelins of infantry after throwing darts come to melee fight. Particularly I have no problem adding a bonus for spear cavalry as well, the conception would be that sword cavalry can do much more damage to general units, but more vulnerable, and spear a unit with less attack power but more resistant. about javelin cav, you may not need a counter, because it already has a very high damage, I would just do what I proposed earlier, increase the attack, decrease the range and +2 pierce resistance.

[BreakfastBurrito_007]

On 26/03/2021 at 4:53 PM, letsplay0ad said:

Let's Fight

• 0 A.D. is an open-source RTS game (https://play0ad.com/)

• Let's Fight is a 0 A.D. gameplay balance mod for Alpha 24 (Xšayāršā)

Motivation

Currently the meta of Alpha 24 is skewed towards turtling via walls, towers, and forts.

This problem is exacerbated by the advantage that archers, units that already have high range, have over other ranged units.

This mod aims to provide gameplay that is more rewarding for aggressive players and roughly equalize the strength of civilizations to allow for a greater variety of strategies.

In particular, there is an emphasis on encouraging players to utilize different strategies depending on the civilization and situation of the game.

Several balance changes in this mod were based on discussions in the "Gameplay Discussion" and "Balancing Discussions" sub-forums.

Installation

• Drag and drop the pyromod file over the 0ad start icon or open the pyromod file with pyrogenesis.exe
• The mod will be downloaded and you will be taken to the "Mod Selection" page (if not, then click "Settings" -> "Mod Selection")
• Click on the "letsfight" mod in the "Available Mods" and click "Enable" in the bottom left
• Click "Save Configuration" in the bottom right
• Click "Start Mods" in the bottom right

Updates

Thanks to the 0ad community for their feedback.

Some people have had questions about the changes or wondered about the justifications.

The reasoning behind each change is placed in brackets behind each bullet point.

v0.2.2

• Reduced health of all buildings [Thanks @Edwarf]
• Fixed mercenary upgrade to rank 3 technology for Carthaginians [Thanks @Edwarf]
• Removed the limit for Carthage embassies [Thanks @0AD Dev Team]
• Moved Iberian monument to town phase [Thanks @0AD Dev Team]
• Have Iberian monument count towards city phase requirement
• Lowered the limit on fortresses and towers

v0.2.1

• Automatically set mercenaries to rank 2 and halve training time [Thanks @Nescio]
• Mercenary upgrade to rank 3 technology for Carthaginians [Thanks @borg-]
• Fixed health bonus to military units with each phase up [Thanks @Valihrant]

v0.2

• Increase cavalry move speed [Thanks @Valihrant]
• Increase turn rates for infantry and cavalry [Thanks @Valihrant]
• Added a minimum distance between forts and civic centres [Thanks @faction02]

All Changes

Units

• Cavalry and Infantry javelineers accuracy increased (spread reduced since they became much less effective in fights compared to all other ranged units)
• Infantry javelineer walk speed increased (to allow skirmishers to chase slingers and archers and prevent formation laming)
• Infantry slinger walk speed increased (to chase archers, but still be slower than javelineers and prevent formation laming)
• Cavalry and Infantry archers attack rate reduced and damage increased (to have players make a choice between the pros and cons of different ranged options rather than an obvious winner with high range, damage, and attack rate as higher attack rates provide a demonstrable advantage in practice even with equal theoretical damage-per-second)
• Melee cavalry health increased (to make melee cavalry more effective in fighting and rushing as they currently are underutilized and tend to lose to massed range)
• Reduced training time of cavalry, infantry, and women (to allow players to make the choice of either rushing or a larger boom)
• Increase cavalry move speed (to enable raiding as it is currently disadvantageous to attempt in all stages of the game compared to booming)
• Increase turn rates for infantry and cavalry (allow better engagements for aggressors while still keeping in the intent of preventing dancing)
• Automatically set mercenaries to rank 2 and halve training time (since mercenaries have prohibitive cost compared to the value they provide as they do not have enhanced stats without this upgrade or the ability to gather resources)
• Fixed health bonus to military units with each phase up (tradeoff of having more pop or phasing up for a hp bonus during a fight or push to allow for more variety of timing strategies)

Siege

• Allow rams to hit fields and units (to allow for fast clearing of space and to prevent laming by body blocking)
• Reduce wood cost of catapults (to compensate for the inability to effectively fight units as area-of-effect damage was removed)

Buildings

• Increase the resource cost and build time of palisades, stone walls, and Roman siege walls (to prevent abuse of walling which also throttles the game due to the increased pathfinding workload)
• Reduced arrow damage of civic center, sentry tower, defense tower, and fort (to prevent defensive structure abuse and have players make the choice between a larger army with higher damage but lower durability or defensive structures with lower damage and higher durability rather than getting the best of both worlds at minimal cost and decision-making)
• Reduced health of sentry tower, defense tower, and fort (to prevent defensive structure abuse and allow unit pushes to be more effective in the late game rather than having territory creep and turtling be the obvious choice of strategy in all situations)
• Theater buffed to have more territory weight and influence (since it did not provide a significant advantage for its cost)
• Roman army camp can produce siege engines and cost 100 more wood and 300 more metal (to allow for greater variety of strategies at a greater cost)
• Increase outpost vision when not garrisoned, but give greater vision when garrisoned (to make outposts useful while still rewarding garrisoned units)
• Allow Macedonians to produce arsenals at the town phase (to allow greater strategic variety and compensate for the loss of the uniqueness of the siege workshop from A23)
• Added a minimum distance between forts and civic centres (to have players make the choice of increasing territory via a civic centre or securing territory via a fort instead of allowing both at low risk)
• Lowered the limit on fortresses and towers (to encourage more strategic placing of forts as opposed to spamming and to prevent mass fort and tower abuse)
• Removed the limit for Carthage embassies (since the limit on the number of embassies greatly restricted the variety of strategies players could employ with Carthage mercenaries)
• Moved Iberian monument to town phase (to provide more opportunities to use this building as part a combat asset earlier in the game)
• Reduced health of all buildings (since even civic buildings such as houses and economic buildings such as storehouses took upwards of seven hits by rams to destroy)

Technology

• Reduced city phase requirement from 4 to 3 (to encourage boom/earlier aggression and de-incentivize tower abuse while also encouraging usage of other special town phase buildings unique to certain civilizations)
• Defensive towers do not count in city phase requirement (to discourage turtling and de-incentivize tower abuse while also encouraging usage of other special town phase buildings unique to certain civilizations)
• Sentry towers do not count in town phase requirement (to discourage turtling and de-incentivize tower abuse)
• Reduced metal cost of all farmstead and storehouse technologies by half and increased wood cost to compensate (since metal is scarce on popular maps and is required for many strategies)
• Reduced metal cost of all forge upgrades by half and increased wood cost to compensate (since metal is scarce on popular maps and is required for many strategies)
• Remove food cost for non-champion mercenaries (since mercenaries' high metal cost coupled with their inability to gather resources necessitates an advantage to compensate; also, since the intent was to have them be more realistic by costing gold or metal, then food should not be one of their costs)
• Add cartography to market while keeping the option in civic centres (to still allow players the choice of taking cartography in the village phase, but also have the choice to take it in the town phase without sacrificing unit production)
• Bring back carrier pigeons and stone foundations for outposts (to give the choice between achieving greater utility at the cost of a garrisoned unit or at the cost of time and resources through technologies)
• Arsenals produced by the Macedonians count towards city phase requirement (to allow greater strategic variety and compensate for the loss of the uniqueness of the siege workshop from A23)
• Mercenary upgrade to rank 3 technology for Carthaginians (to give a differentiating trait to Carthage and an incentive to try a mercenary army strategy as Carthage has the greatest mercenary diversity)
• Have Iberian monument count towards city phase requirement (to provide more opportunities to use this building as part a combat asset earlier in the game)

Thoughts, Comments, Suggestions? Discuss!

I've tested this mod against the AI, but the best results are from real players.

Try some games with other players and then let me know what changes you liked and disliked.

Feel free to make other suggestions that you would like to see in this mod after testing it out.

 

letsfight_v0.2.2.pyromod 233 kB · 9 downloads letsfight_v0.2.1.pyromod 179 kB · 12 downloads letsfight_v0.2.pyromod 171 kB · 4 downloads letsfight_v0.1.pyromod 147 kB · 7 downloads

Hello again everybody,

I was trying to get a multiplayer game going with the mod recently and I tried to update from the first version. I tried to get "letsfight_v0.2.2.pyromod" as it seemed to be the most recent version and the one the host was using. When I downloaded the mods and installed them by following the same procedure as the first release, it seemed to replace the first version of the mod but keep the old name of the first release along with (2.2) after the name. After I save configuration and start mods and go to join a game, I find that I need the "letsfight_v0.2.2" rather than the "letsfight (2.2)"  I am not very good at computer stuff so perhaps someone could point to what I am doing wrong.

Thanks in advance!

 

[Nescio]

23 hours ago, hyperion said:

Seconded. Any number limits except for heroes and wonder, which could be labelled natural, I'd rather see removed entirely.

Some limits are functional, e.g. war dogs have an entity limit (of 20) because they require 0 population. Domestic animals ought to have a limit too, to prevent lag: https://code.wildfiregames.com/D3777

Towers and fortresses are already limited by their costs and minimum distance; having an entity on top of that is unnecessary, I agree: https://code.wildfiregames.com/D3778

17 hours ago, letsplay0ad said:

@Radiotraining and @hyperion I agree that hard limits are undesirable. My original intention was to have the number of fortresses you could build be equal to the number of civic centres you had (ie: a castle for every city/village/town), but I couldn't get it to work.

Why not? You already found the simulation/templates/special/player/player.xml file, just insert:

  <EntityLimits>
    <LimitChangers>
      <Fortress>
        <CivilCentre>1</CivilCentre>
      </Fortress>
    </LimitChangers>
  </EntityLimits>

 

37 minutes ago, BreakfastBurrito_007 said:

Hello again everybody,

I was trying to get a multiplayer game going with the mod recently and I tried to update from the first version. I tried to get "letsfight_v0.2.2.pyromod" as it seemed to be the most recent version and the one the host was using. When I downloaded the mods and installed them by following the same procedure as the first release, it seemed to replace the first version of the mod but keep the old name of the first release along with (2.2) after the name. After I save configuration and start mods and go to join a game, I find that I need the "letsfight_v0.2.2" rather than the "letsfight (2.2)"  I am not very good at computer stuff so perhaps someone could point to what I am doing wrong.

Thanks in advance!

Locate your local mods folder (see https://trac.wildfiregames.com/wiki/GameDataPaths ), delete all versions of the mod, then download the newest again.

[Lion.Kanzen]

It is good that people make mistakes, otherwise they would not know why certain decisions are made, before I was opposed to changes like these.

 

If they suddenly want the Mongolian cavalry to appear represented by a javelin rider, let them do it, it is ridiculous to discuss a mod with little sense and made for fun.

I understand when what they are looking for is just fun.

 

 

[hyperion]

1 hour ago, Nescio said:

Some limits are functional, e.g. war dogs have an entity limit (of 20) because they require 0 population. Domestic animals ought to have a limit too, to prevent lag: https://code.wildfiregames.com/D3777

As dogs and sheep don't count against the global pop cap a local one is fine. However 50 for sheep isn't enough. In a 300 pop cap game you may need over 40 corals to keep up with food production. So make it at least 100 if you really want to cap sheep unless you actually intend to nerf corral use.

 

3 hours ago, Nescio said:

Towers and fortresses are already limited by their costs and minimum distance; having an entity on top of that is unnecessary, I agree: https://code.wildfiregames.com/D3778

Beside those with hard distance limit like towers, there are also those with soft distance limit like lighthouse or Ashoka's pillars where a number limit is pointless. Add to that number limits for entities that are trivial to balance like embassies or juggernaut.

Also your habit of adding in unrelated changes kicked in again . Please split such patches.

[letsplay0ad]

@borg- You're right, removing the citizen-soldier capability of units would make balancing much easier (as you remove the economy part of the equation), but what I really like about 0 A.D. is the citizen-soldier concept. I've never seen it in any of the RTS games I've played before. I think the hard counter system you had in your expansion mod was pretty great for balance, but I also find the soft counter system really fun. It's a tough decision-making process.

 

@maroder Good idea! I'll try tweaking the damage values for siege engines. The catapult would definitely benefit.

 

@Nescio Thanks for the tip! I'll try it out.

[Nescio]

11 hours ago, hyperion said:

Also your habit of adding in unrelated changes kicked in again . Please split such patches.

What do you mean? One for towers and one for fortresses?

[hyperion]

22 minutes ago, Nescio said:

What do you mean? One for towers and one for fortresses?

Dropping number limits (for both in the same patch) and one for increasing minimum distance. Beside the two changes not being more linked than most other separate commits, the two commit subject can actually describe all changes.

[Dakara]

Hello,

We don't need to emulate Age of Empire bonuses to have a healthy and fun game. Some basic principles can be applied. Perhaps we can take inspiration from total war.

Review the armor values of each type of unit and create a new unit. 

HEAVY INFANTERY (SWORD WITH SHIELD, SPEAR INFANTERY, PIKEMEN)

LIGHT INFANTERY (SWORD WITHOUT SHIELD, AXEMAN WITHOUT SHIELD, PILLAGER (loot X 2) , IMAGINE MORE UNITS IN THIS CATEGORY ?)

ARCHERS/SLINGERS

SKIRMISH

CAVALERY/CHARIOT

CHAMPION (SAME ORTHER CATEGORY BUT MORE ARMOR AND ATTACK THANK TO QUALITY EQUIPMENT)

ELEFANT

 

Archers/Slingers without a shield must have 0 armor. Trash support unit. They did good dammage at unit without armor and shield-> Natural counter of archers and slingers and all units without shield. Not to mention their ability to keep enemies away thanks to their range. They are not hard counter cavalery but they did dammage where orther units without range can do dammage. I would like to insist that unprotected archers should be demolished in melee as no armor and difficult to shoot at very low range.

I like spear cav. They did good damage at orther cav and it really good ! They are very useful in their role.

For skirmish more armor against arrow and agility (they run more fast archer and heavy infantery). Why not make it a harass unit. Low speed attack rate but big dammage. 25% more dammage against infantery melee. Attack and run. Easy killed by cavalery and useful against infantery melee. Balance against archer beacause low range and armor good against arrow.

Spear infantery is good. They tank a bit but not tooo much. They sould speed run as sword with shield. They sould destroy all cavalery and ranged at melee fight. Maybe they lack dammage in late game against cavalery. 

Pikemen should be very tanky slow. They sould destroy all cavalery and ranged at melee fight. They can also block ennemy unit with big range melee attack.

Sword with shield have more armor because they have shield. They already did good dammage at building so it ok. Maybe more dammage against melee infantery.  1 vs 1 they win against pikemen and spear infantery but not too fast. 

New unit for some civ ,maybe 2 or 3. Light infantery, sword or axe without shield and little amount of armor. and very low armor vs arrow. Fabric or leather garment. Good run speed. And a bit more dammage on building than sword with shield. 

 

 

Also, for a slight differentiation of civilizations we can imagine that the Carthaginian archers have a shield (already present in their appearance) and benefit from a little overall armor, and reduce their range from 5 to 10 meters to balance. For one orther civ, skirmish without shield : no armor but +5 range and +1 movespeed + 1 dammage?

 

 

And please after this change, if neccessary more hp to unit. it very fun to have fight little more long. Maybe 15-20% hp ?

 

Thanks for reading