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

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

Centurions added to the game for the Romans: https://trac.wildfiregames.com/changeset/27400

 

[Dizaka]

5 hours ago, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

Centurions added to the game for the Romans: https://trac.wildfiregames.com/changeset/27400

 

I was going to say type but OH that is cool.  You can promote either of spearmen or swordsmen.

[real_tabasco_sauce]

26 minutes ago, Dizaka said:

I was going to say type but OH that is cool.  You can promote either of spearmen or swordsmen.

You actually already can in the community mod

[real_tabasco_sauce]

On 05/01/2023 at 7:16 AM, Stan` said:

To all that contributed, please state how you'd like to be credited in the balancing credits. Options are full name, nickname, or both.

@real_tabasco_sauce

[Dizaka]

2 minutes ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

You actually already can in the community mod

Oh wow, it's hidden well lol.  Didn't see it at first glance.  Will look for it.

[real_tabasco_sauce]

7 minutes ago, Dizaka said:

Oh wow, it's hidden well lol.  Didn't see it at first glance.  Will look for it.

yeah, one of the improvements in the aforementioned patch is that all spearmen and swordsmen will have a tooltip explaining that rank 3 units can be promoted to centurions.

This way you can see this information when you actually go to train them.

[Gurken Khan]

Since the Han have Archery Training at the stables I assume horse archers also profit from it. Maybe add "and Cavalry Archers" to the descritption to clarify?

[borg-]

It would be interesting to have a rank 2 upgrade only for melee inf. They are weakeat units in game for a long time, so i think that helps balance things out.

[real_tabasco_sauce]

52 minutes ago, borg- said:

It would be interesting to have a rank 2 upgrade only for melee inf. They are weakeat units in game for a long time, so i think that helps balance things out.

I think this would partially invalidate the value of infantry mercenaries.

I would rather melee inf be more impactful in the first place (not just meatshield, but actually dealing damage). I have an idea for this and I will make a MR for it in the a27 community mod.

[real_tabasco_sauce]

On 29/12/2022 at 3:34 PM, Gurken Khan said:

Just wanted to throw in here that my spearmen are the first to die. Or the only, actually. So if their survivability is further reduced, I probably won't even take them along (again).

Well consider this: since ranged units account for between 70 to 95 percent of the damage from a given army, and they target the closest unit by default, then without any sniping, melee units will always die first even if they have 100 pierce armor.

If melee units dealt more damage, their survival would now depend on both the enemy melee units as well as ranged units.

Should a player invest in some stronger melee units and get melee upgrades, their more rapid success against the weaker enemy melee units will force the exposed ranged units to retreat.

So basically the rationale is this: give melee units a much improved share of impact in terms of determining the outcome of a fight, and balance them accordingly by reducing the armor a little.

[real_tabasco_sauce]

https://code.wildfiregames.com/D4877

the rest of the community mod features.

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

23 minutes ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

I think this would partially invalidate the value of infantry mercenaries.

I can't put my finger on it, but EA's version of mercenaries feels feature-incomplete to me. 

[real_tabasco_sauce]

2 hours ago, Gurken Khan said:

Since the Han have Archery Training at the stables I assume horse archers also profit from it. Maybe add "and Cavalry Archers" to the descritption to clarify?

All other civs have it in the forge. I am unsure why its in the barracks/stable.

[Gurken Khan]

4 minutes ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

All other civs have it in the forge. I am unsure why its in the barracks/stable.

I think it should be in the forge.

[chrstgtr]

54 minutes ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

I think this would partially invalidate the value of infantry mercenaries.

I would rather melee inf be more impactful in the first place (not just meatshield, but actually dealing damage). I have an idea for this and I will make a MR for it in the a27 community mod.

I took the post to mean that you could do some sort of upgrades once at level 2. Kind of like centurions are at level 3. Not sure what upgrade there should be, though 

Agree with the second part. 

54 minutes ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

I think this would partially invalidate the value of infantry mercenaries.

I would rather melee inf be more impactful in the first place (not just meatshield, but actually dealing damage). I have an idea for this and I will make a MR for it in the a27 community mod.

I took the post to mean that you could do some sort of upgrades once at level 2. Kind of like centurions are at level 3. Not sure what upgrade there should be, though 

Agree with the second part. 

Edit: I also question whether experiment where mercs producing at rank 2 has failed. It's caused huge balance issues and isn't particularly interesting (see @wowgetoffyourcellphone above). I wonder if we should try a different route. Maybe making merc produce super quickly.

I've also thought that since mercs fight for the highest bidder that maybe they should be convertible (i.e., you can bribe a portion of the opposing army to change sides and fight for you. I'm not sure if the game even supports that, though. Convertible units would prevent pure spam strategies if mercs get trained super quickly.

Edited January 10, 2023 by chrstgtr

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

22 minutes ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

All other civs have it in the forge. I am unsure why its in the barracks/stable.

 

17 minutes ago, Gurken Khan said:

I think it should be in the forge.

I think I put it there because, frankly, it doesn't make sense in the Forge. It's not a weapon or armor upgrade, it's a training thing. Also, put it there as a differentiator, but it's a small change so I'm not wed to it. But for real, maybe investigate moving Archery Training to the Barracks for every archer civ. 

[alre]

2 hours ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

Well consider this: since ranged units account for between 70 to 95 percent of the damage from a given army, and they target the closest unit by default, then without any sniping, melee units will always die first even if they have 100 pierce armor.

If melee units dealt more damage, their survival would now depend on both the enemy melee units as well as ranged units.

Should a player invest in some stronger melee units and get melee upgrades, their more rapid success against the weaker enemy melee units will force the exposed ranged units to retreat.

So basically the rationale is this: give melee units a much improved share of impact in terms of determining the outcome of a fight, and balance them accordingly by reducing the armor a little.

there is demand to buff melee inf, so just buff melee inf. at this point you are just trying to keep melee inf bad.

[real_tabasco_sauce]

5 minutes ago, alre said:

there is demand to buff melee inf, so just buff melee inf. at this point you are just trying to keep melee inf bad.

How could you say that? That makes no sense. Stop with the negativity at least until you see the gitlab branch.

[borg-]

Sure, so maybe a new movement speed tech? Can help melee infantry engane on cavalry/range inf

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

https://trac.wildfiregames.com/changeset/27410

[hyperion]

19 minutes ago, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

https://trac.wildfiregames.com/changeset/27410

Sorry to say, but this should have been split into five patches. A patch that reads as squash unrelated changes is plain awful.

[hyperion]

45 minutes ago, alre said:

there is demand to buff melee inf, so just buff melee inf. at this point you are just trying to keep melee inf bad.

The most sane proposal in this thread wrt. this issue made by @Feldfeld to half all ranged damage seems to get categorically ignored.

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

1 minute ago, hyperion said:

Sorry to say, but this should have been split into five patches. A patch that reads as squash unrelated changes is plain awful.

I agree for the most part, but the changes aren't massive and can be tweaked or changed if necessary quite easily. 

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

Just now, hyperion said:

The most sane proposal in this thread wrt. this issue made by @Feldfeld to half all ranged damage seems to get categorically ignored.

Indeed. Ranged damage should be a nice bonus or harrasser, not the primary damager of an army. Even range-heavy civs like Persians and Han would have had to engage with their melee troops to decide the matter, let alone the Romans and Greeks and Celts who all used ranged troops in a secondary or even tertiary role.

[chrstgtr]

28 minutes ago, borg- said:

Sure, so maybe a new movement speed tech? Can help melee infantry engane on cavalry/range inf

I’ve been saying this for awhile. It’s logically consistent with what we have (farther range units move slowest) and should also help balance by slowing melee to engage