Introducing the Official community mod for 0 A.D. Empires Ascendant

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

2 minutes ago, chrstgtr said:

Making inf faster doesn’t mean they can attack more times. It just means they can close the gap quicker (if the cav decide to stop at all).

 

I like the "stickiness" feature in AOE4 (and Rome Total War), where if cav are hit by spearmen they temporarily lose aa small amount of speed. It's more pronounced in Rome Total War, which has more realistic simulation-mechanics, but it's also there in AOE4. 

[real_tabasco_sauce]

@chrstgtrI see what you are saying, and honestly, I agree, but I would like to maintain the mobility of cavalry as its primary advantage over infantry (instead of just being better in every aspect). If our only nerf is speed, and we leave damage at 18 for skirm cav, I think you will see even more players just simply using them as a replacement for skirmishers, which makes for poor gameplay.

To avoid this, they should do the same damage as infantry.

Edited November 28, 2022 by real_tabasco_sauce

[real_tabasco_sauce]

One other option could be to lower the hack armor of ranged cavalry.

[alre]

melee inf should all deal twice the damage it deals now. that would solve the problem.

[real_tabasco_sauce]

5 minutes ago, alre said:

melee inf should all deal twice the damage it deals now. that would solve the problem.

I would like to do a melee damage increase (also some armor adjustment) later on for meatshield meta purposes, but this isn't an appropriate change for the problem at hand.

what could be done is increase the pierce damage of spearmen such that they damage ranged cav more (with 3 hack 1 pierce armor).

spearmen also seem to be generally worse than swords, so I think this would be welcome.

Edited November 28, 2022 by real_tabasco_sauce

[chrstgtr]

13 minutes ago, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

I like the "stickiness" feature in AOE4 (and Rome Total War), where if cav are hit by spearmen they temporarily lose aa small amount of speed. It's more pronounced in Rome Total War, which has more realistic simulation-mechanics, but it's also there in AOE4. 

Sounds like it has potential. Do we have the coding capabilities to do this, though?

12 minutes ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

@chrstgtrI see what you are saying, and honestly, I agree, but I would like to maintain the mobility of cavalry as its primary advantage over infantry (instead of just being better in every aspect). If our only nerf is speed, and we leave damage at 18 for skirm cav, I think you will see even more players just simply using them as a replacement for skirmishers, which makes for poor gameplay.

To avoid this, they should do the same damage as infantry.

I think this is a design question. I don't have a problem with cav dealing with dmg. 

If what you want is inf to be faster relative to cav then a cav speed nerf does the same thing without the other knock on effects for inf. 

13 minutes ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

One other option could be to lower the hack armor of ranged cavalry.

9 minutes ago, alre said:

melee inf should all deal twice the damage it deals now. that would solve the problem.

Both of these would have huge other effects. Namely, a melee buff would impact inf balance and a cav armour nerf would impact cav battles. 

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

3 minutes ago, chrstgtr said:

(re: "Stickiness") Sounds like it has potential. Do we have the coding capabilities to do this, though?

I believe it can be possible with the status effect feature (same feature as poison). @Freagarach @Stan`

Edited November 28, 2022 by wowgetoffyourcellphone

[alre]

3 minutes ago, chrstgtr said:

Both of these would have huge other effects. Namely, a melee buff would impact inf balance and a cav armour nerf would impact cav battles. 

that's the idea.

[real_tabasco_sauce]

2 minutes ago, chrstgtr said:

If what you want is inf to be faster relative to cav then a cav speed nerf does the same thing without the other knock on effects for inf. 

right but it doesnt fix them being tankier, having more armor, and dealing more damage. I'd still say the HP branch is necessary, as well as a jav cav damage nerf:

https://gitlab.com/real_tabasco_sauce/0-a-d-community-mod-unit-specific-upgrades/-/compare/main...cavalry_health?from_project_id=36954588&straight=false

[real_tabasco_sauce]

2 minutes ago, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

6 minutes ago, chrstgtr said:

(re: "Stickiness") Sounds like it has potential. Do we have the coding capabilities to do this, though?

I believe it can be possible with the status effect feature (same feature as poison). @Freagarach @Stan`

personally, I am not a fan. This was in AOE3 and I hated it. it doesn't seem as bad in AOE4, but still I would rather my units' motion be predictable and not dependent on gameplay factors.

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

1 minute ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

personally, I am not a fan. This was in AOE3 and I hated it. it doesn't seem as bad in AOE4, but still I would rather my units' motion be predictable and not dependent on gameplay factors.

Gameplay factors are not predictable?

[chrstgtr]

2 minutes ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

right but it doesnt fix them being tankier, having more armor, and dealing more damage

I don't know if I have a problem with any of that outside of when cav fight spear head on and the cav wins. That's why I said a health nerf for champ melee cav, which decimate CS spear head on. 

6 minutes ago, alre said:

that's the idea.

Wrong discussion. 

[real_tabasco_sauce]

3 minutes ago, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

Gameplay factors are not predictable?

you should always be confident that your units can move as expected, this is why a lot of AOE2 players dislike AOE3 and 4. In AOE3 if a unit gets hit, the whole formation (which the user is forced to use) goes into slow motion.

I think we can solve this without having to add a new mechanic.

[chrstgtr]

4 minutes ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

you should always be confident that your units can move as expected, this is why a lot of AOE2 players dislike AOE3 and 4. In AOE3 if a unit gets hit, the whole formation (which the user is forced to use) goes into slow motion.

 

Totally off topic, but I really dislike how you can't individual control units (or unit types) in formations in a26. 

[real_tabasco_sauce]

5 minutes ago, chrstgtr said:

I don't know if I have a problem with any of that outside of when cav fight spear head on and the cav wins. That's why I said a health nerf for champ melee cav, which decimate CS spear head on. 

I think they should be differentiated units, rather than just superior versions of infantry. What do you think of the health nerf I provided? Would you agree ranged cav are also too tanky? 

I would say the health branch + nerfed jav cav damage + slight speed decrease is ideal.

3 minutes ago, chrstgtr said:

Totally off topic, but I really dislike how you can't individual control units (or unit types) in formations in a26. 

you can change that in options->session->battalions

[BreakfastBurrito_007]

1 hour ago, alre said:

I'm guessing 99999 m/s2 would still be hardly noticeable. let's hear for the math of @LetswaveaBook. 

That would resemble a25 acceleration because the time it would take to reach walk speed would be negligible, so yes it would be noticeable.

[chrstgtr]

9 minutes ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

I think they should be differentiated units, rather than just superior versions of infantry. What do you think of the health nerf I provided? Would you agree ranged cav are also too tanky? 

 

They are differentiated--they are more expensive, have different armor, attack, health, and speed stats. 

I honestly, am not a fan of the proposal in its current form. I don't have a problem with cav except that they don't die when they clearly should (i.e., walking straight through a ball of inf with minimal losses) and spear inf don't counter them (i.e., skirm cav can easily out micro inf spear because of speed AND champ, merc, and promoted CS melee cav can easily beat spear inf in a head on fight).

I have no problem with skirm cav dmg.

EDIT: there are lots of differing opinions, here, which is why I think revisions to cav should be taken on as individual units (i.e., work on champ sword cav first) instead of an overall change to all cav. 

9 minutes ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

you can change that in options->session->battalions

Very helpful. Thank you. 

Edited November 28, 2022 by chrstgtr

[BreakfastBurrito_007]

29 minutes ago, chrstgtr said:

50 minutes ago, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

I like the "stickiness" feature in AOE4 (and Rome Total War), where if cav are hit by spearmen they temporarily lose aa small amount of speed. It's more pronounced in Rome Total War, which has more realistic simulation-mechanics, but it's also there in AOE4. 

Sounds like it has potential. Do we have the coding capabilities to do this, though?

I would be ok with this only if it was on a unit by unit basis (to prevent the AOE3 implementation) and I think the mechanic needs to be designed so that subsequent spear hits have less of this effect (so that the cav can eventually get away rather than being permanently stuck). 

[real_tabasco_sauce]

58 minutes ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

what could be done is increase the pierce damage of spearmen such that they damage ranged cav more (with 3 hack 1 pierce armor).

spearmen also seem to be generally worse than swords, so I think this would be welcome.

what about this?

the cav speed nerf (is -1 m/s too much?) and this might be enough for the near term.

Edited November 28, 2022 by real_tabasco_sauce

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

23 minutes ago, chrstgtr said:

Totally off topic, but I really dislike how you can't individual control units (or unit types) in formations in a26. 

Not only can you turn this off, you can also set a hotkey to have both worlds. (in my setup, I can Alt-Shift to select units out of a formation).

[chrstgtr]

10 minutes ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

what about this?

The problem is cav. I wouldn't mess with inf stats because that will have other knock on effects. 

11 minutes ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

the cav speed nerf (is 1 m/s too much?) and this might be enough for the near term.

Maybe. Would have to test. I would be in favor of it. Sidenote: this would also really help inf vs. archer cav. I am not sure that is a "fix" that needs to happen (as opposed to just have cav be the counter to archer cav), but it is a fix I would like. 

5 minutes ago, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

Not only can you turn this off, you can also set a hotkey to have both worlds. (in my setup, I can Alt-Shift to select units out of a formation).

Very helpful. Thank you. I just don't like the current set up because it makes it difficult to snipe and easy to lose your hero. But this fixes that.

[real_tabasco_sauce]

k all done:

merge requests:https://gitlab.com/0ad/0ad-community-mod-a26/-/merge_requests

branches comparison:

https://gitlab.com/real_tabasco_sauce/0-a-d-community-mod-unit-specific-upgrades/-/compare/main...cav_speed?from_project_id=36954588&straight=false

https://gitlab.com/0ad/0ad-community-mod-a26/-/merge_requests/22/diffs

These 2 shouldn't make a very big difference overall, but I expect them to help bring down cavalry's survivability.

Feel free to comment on other merge requests I have submitted. I did one lowering crush armor, one for allowing the roman army camp in p2, and one for adjusting pikemen damage/armor.

also, there is a slight crossbow nerf.

Edited November 28, 2022 by real_tabasco_sauce

[chrstgtr]

50 minutes ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

what about this?

Not a fan. Cav is the problem. I wouldn't change inf stats because that impacts other stuff. Spears are meant to be worse than swords. 

51 minutes ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

the cav speed nerf (is -1 m/s too much?) and this might be enough for the near term.

Maybe. Would have to be tested. I would support. 

45 minutes ago, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

Not only can you turn this off, you can also set a hotkey to have both worlds. (in my setup, I can Alt-Shift to select units out of a formation).

Awesome. Thanks. 

[Philip the Swaggerless]

Make Alexander Great Again

When playing as Macedonians, who actually chooses Alexander the Great as their preferred hero?  From his conquest, Macedon quickly became the largest ancient empire!  People looked back on him for generations as OP.  I think he should be THE or ONE OF the top heroes of this game.

10% Territory increase doesn't help you much in the game.  Especially since, IIRC, your territory's ability to take over enemy territory is diluted by how large your territory influence is.

I've tried to use the CC capture thing to my advantage, but haven't found it very strong.  You pretty much need to damage the enemy CC no matter what, which is fair.  It is a cool idea, but it can't be his only thing.

Attack bonus vs other heroes is a cool minor perk.  Still weaker than Cleopatra's health de-buff.

I propose his benefits be:

Alexander

• Counters: 1.2x bonus vs Heroes
• Conqueror: Enemy Civic Centers - 50% Capture Points Garrisoned Regeneration Rate. 60 meters
• Inspired Defense: When garrisoned, the structure has +2 capture points garrison regeneration rate.
• Imperialism: Structures + 10 Territory Influence Radius

 

• 40 Meter Aura: Own Soldiers (not siege) +10% Ranged and Melee Damage.
  • He wasn't just some guy who captured buildings.  His army kicked butt on the field.  (Same rationale for below)
• 50 Meter Aura: Enemy units & Structures -10% Ranged and Melee Attack Damage
  • I think this is better than an armor boost because it emphasizes his active role in battles.  He can't sit back behind everyone to get the benefit.  However, I wouldn't want it to promote "dancing."   An alternate would be Own Units + 1 Hack/Pierce/Crush Damage.

If these benefits seem to make Philip II irrelevant, maybe his aura could be changed to a Pikeman bonus, since I believe he was the one that the whole pikeman thing going.  I don't feel strongly that this is necessary but here is one idea.

Philip II

Rise of Macedon: Champions + 2 Capture Attack, +20% Ranged/Melee Damage

Pikemen + 100% Melee Damage

 

 

Edited November 28, 2022 by Philip the Swaggerless
increased defensive aura from 40-50 meters

[alre]

2 hours ago, BreakfastBurrito_007 said:

That would resemble a25 acceleration because the time it would take to reach walk speed would be negligible, so yes it would be noticeable.

what I meant is I don't see noticeable effects of acceleration on inf vs cav gameplay. unit chasing with equal speed units is different in this regard, although one must factor running.