Alpha 26 Feedback

[chrstgtr]

7 hours ago, Stan` said:

Yeah we talked about this yesterday, it might have counterbalanced the pushing changes for rams.

@wraitii

I think the explanation above seems possible. Rams don’t seem overall quicker or slower to me. I have noticed, on occasion, that rams do very slow zigs and zags through obstacles, though

It’s still the early days on the alpha, but. aside from Han, nothing stands out as major being a major change or huge imbalance.  

I’m sure we’ll notice stuff as time goes on, but I’m starting to feel more comfortable with overall balance, which means we should (hopefully) be able to implement more new features/bigger changes soon. It would also be nice if in the next alpha we cleaned up some of the other lingering problems that we know exist but haven’t been addressed yet (I.e. making heroes more balanced across civs, making wonders useful, etc). 
 

Overall, this feels like a boring (but needed) update for most old civs, a decent facelift for Persians (credit to @borg_ there) and, of course, a huge update with Han.

[alre]

20 hours ago, wraitii said:

I'm also curious about unit pushing improvements in a more general sense, how does it feel?

I think it improved the game a lot. consequences are substantial: battles take more time, units are a bit more visible, I'm thinking skirmishers are less op than before, chokepoints are significant again. I'm also seeing more units getting stuck sometimes.

[wraitii]

1 hour ago, alre said:

I'm also seeing more units getting stuck sometimes.

In a good or a bad way ? 

[alre]

in a bad way. it's not affecting the game too much imo.

Personally, I believe it's necessary to raise unit clearance, otherwise it's impossible to avoid units trying to get too close to each other.

[wraitii]

To be honest it seems to me like AoE 4 (our main competitor lol) is doing quite similar to us in terms of unit overlap.

But we can always experiment further.

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

A26 = merc sword cav deluxe alpha again?  

[Lion.Kanzen]

It would be great if we made the balance mod a form of monthly update.

[real_tabasco_sauce]

9 hours ago, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

A26 = merc sword cav deluxe alpha again?  

they don't quite have the glory they used to XD, but they are still very good.

[Charah]

Good afternoon, I am glad that the project is developing. But now I'm throwing a whole lot of negativity, please don't be offended. I do not know who set up the AI bot, but you partially broke it.
Comments on the behavior of the BOT Petra in general:

1. The bot does not make part of the units.
2. When switching to T2 and T3 (and after some time) the bot may stop making some units of the previous era.
3. At some point, the Ptolemy and Selekvids bot may simply stop making citizen warriors and women. As a result, its economy is simply dying due to lack of resources. For understanding – at one point in the battle between two bots with approximately equal population, the ratio of workers was 40 to 160.
4. Since the bot moves attacking units from point to point, is it possible to make them move in formation? This can get rid of the situation when the cavalry has already died, and the heavy infantry has not even reached yet.
5. Women have become a little more active in running away during an attack, but still do not hide and die in packs.
6. Soldiers are still massively stomping into towers and fortresses, paying little attention to the enemy. Their behavior has become a little better, they react more often to an attack, but at the same time the shooters die in packs, trying to get through a bunch of enemies.
7. The bot studies espionage and anti-espionage technologies. What for? He can see the whole map anyway.
8. The Spartan arrow launcher is still used by the bot to shoot at buildings.
9. When setting up a building, how does the bot calculate the distance? Or puts it in pre-specified places. Very often warehouses and barns are located close to the source of resources, only on the hills, and resources are at the bottom, as a result, units go back and forth a lot.
10. Elephants and heroes on elephants are trying to hide in the fortress.

Some comments on the behavior of bots of different nations:
1. Kush does not make swordsmen and mounted spearmen. On T2 (after some time) makes only pikemen and archers.
2.  Kush  on T3 often makes too many mercenaries, to the detriment of the elite and battle elephants.
3. Kush does not make a cavalry of spearmen-citizens (in any case, I have never seen them)
4. Ptolmei on T3 often does not make pikemen and slingers, as a result, he runs out of workers and the economy dies. Probably, the matter is in priority – mercenaries (spearmen and archers), by classes for AI replace the usual infantry and "stronger".
5. The same situation with selekevid.
6. Han on T2 and T3 does not make cavalry with swords, and this is their only unit purely with a chopping attack, and they really have nothing to fight off rams with.
7. Han does not use ministers and does not create foot archers.
8. Athens does not make epibates (and this is the only unit with a slashing attack) and often prefers hired archers rather than elite ones.
9. The Persian does not make riders with an axe at all, and this is the only unit with a significant chopping attack, which means they have nothing really to beat the battering rams with.
10. The Persian often makes horsemen with spears after studying elite cavalry, when they are no longer needed, but does not make them on T2.
11. The Persian does not make infantrymen of the Lydian auxiliaries (spear throwers).
12. The Persian does not use immortals with bows.
13. Sparta and Athens do not or do not improve the "Hoplite tradition". For them, this is one of the most useful improvements.
14. Sparta - in half of the cases, the bot uses not battering rams, but arrow-throwers to attack buildings
15. Mauri does not make swordsmen and horsemen with swords. Does not make warriors with a mace and archers on an elephant. As a result, there are no infantry to destroy the rams. Only their battering rams and elephants.

Notes for map developers:
1. On the map of the Gali Highlands – bots can't get to the cows in the pens
2. The Greek Acropolis is on the map – the bot also cannot get to the sheep and the tree behind the fence
3. Do not surround resources with a solid wall. It may be beautiful, but it can break the behavior of the bot.

Questions and thoughts on balance:
1. Isn't it fat for Athens to have epibates on T2? Top swordsmen from T3 are not too much at this stage?
2. Why do the Persians need chariots? In terms of parameters, they are identical to horse archers.
3. Absolutely unbalanced heroes in the game. I have already seen a separate branch in the game on this score. There are two options here – to use historical achievements and personality traits, or to go more from the balance side.
For understanding:
1. All 3 heroes of the Ptolemies are excellent – we reduce the cost of all mercenaries, increase the life of the infantry or accelerate its attack.
2. Maurya does not have any such bonus.
  a. What is "better" – regeneration for warriors nearby at 0.8 hp per second, or +80 HP for elite pikemen from Ptolemies?
  b. Fat elephant without bonuses?
  c. Discount on technology research in the temple, which is used, to put it mildly, not often, and besides, there is a native discount of 50%. This bonus is useless.
3. Rome has two attack bonuses (cavalry and all) and one for defense, and this one is also for the whole map. Everything for the war and nothing for the economy, this is an interesting option.
4. Kush has bonuses to attack everyone, the elite and a discount on one type of elite. And is this bonus "equal" to the discount on mercenaries from Ptolemies? Or is he inferior to him in benefits?
It seems to me that it would be worth trying to create some kind of balance here, so that each nation would have bonuses for both combat and discounts. Or maybe in different combinations, but so that they are approximately "comparable" in benefits. Give nations bonuses and heroes so that they are all about the same level, because now there are nations with useful heroes and bonuses, and boring ones.

Divide the bonuses by type: increased attack, defense, discount, ore mining bonus, hp, etc. Check their balance, give them to weak heroes.
 

a copy of this information is in the general chat of known issues. I think it can be atm deleted.

Edited October 4, 2022 by Charah

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

4 hours ago, Charah said:

Divide the bonuses by type: increased attack, defense, discount, ore mining bonus, hp, etc. Check their balance, give them to weak heroes.

This. Work has to be done to balance the heroes.

[Carltonus]

5 hours ago, Charah said:

1. Isn't it fat for Athens to have epibates on T2? Top swordsmen from T3 are not too much at this stage?

In previous alphas, there used to be a mercenary Thracian swordsman, but the building that produces it got removed. I am for the epibates/marines to be citizen infantry swordsmen instead, and fast ones too.

5 hours ago, Charah said:

2. Why do the Persians need chariots? In terms of parameters, they are identical to horse archers.

For now. If a dedicated turret system is in place for these bad boys. with the Petra AI should be allowed to arbitrarily add/remove troops to/from them, the primary attack changes to the scythes as intended.

5 hours ago, Charah said:

3. Absolutely unbalanced heroes in the game. I have already seen a separate branch in the game on this score. There are two options here – to use historical achievements and personality traits, or to go more from the balance side.

We need more hero actors, especially for scenarios. Generic ones for regicide/herocide too. We don't even have one for the legendary Julius Caesar and Mark Antony! among others.

It appears that you are using a translator to reply to this thread. Especially the "fat" and "we", some of these make no sense to me, though.

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

15 minutes ago, Carltonus said:

We need more hero actors, especially for scenarios. Generic ones for regicide/herocide too. We don't even have one for the legendary Julius Caesar and Mark Antony! among others.

 

We can create a generic "General" unit for each civ that can be used in Herocide mode. Basically, it'd mix and match textures and props to make a new unique unit specifically for Herocide.

About Caesar and Mark Antony, I'd love to add them, honestly. Atlas-only units are low priority or projects of opportunity for now. Honestly, creating/modding additional historical heroes would be a great project for someone just starting out in modding. The modding communities of a lot of games are chock full of these kinds of little projects. The good thing about 0 A.D. is that if your mod is good quality then it' very likely to be included in the base game for wider exposure to your work. You generally don't find that kind of thing in a commercial game.

 

I'm currently updating Terra Magna, Millennium A.D., Two-Gendered Citizens, Aristeia, and Ponies Ascendant to Alpha 26 status so we can have all of them available to players again. After that, encouraging people to get into modding can be my next thing (interspersed with bug fixing, which is a constant @#$%).

Edited October 4, 2022 by wowgetoffyourcellphone

[guerringuerrin]

On 27/09/2022 at 10:05 AM, Kampot said:

This release is getting sluggish if compare with previous 0.25. Units respons a bit later, fight get even more computation lags. 

Would be cool if you focus for 0.27 only on performance tunning and nothing else..

Despite I don't notice this change u mention I totally agree. The engine needs huge performance improvements. Most of us are aware this would need deep hard work in the code but its one of the most necessary steps the project needs to become more popular.
 

On 27/09/2022 at 4:23 AM, chrstgtr said:

Pretty huge oversight that we missed during testing: Han farm upgrades only work for p2.

I think this needs a necessary patch. Most of the ppl wouldn't play the community mod even it's a good idea. Is that hard to make a patch that fixes this without the need of compile a whole new release?

 

Thanks anyway to all the people working on the project we know u do the best u can do considering the circumstances

[Charah]

Yes, I use a translator, I'm sorry, but my knowledge of the language is not enough to communicate without it((
fat in this case means too much, too strong.
Yes, it seems to me that these fighters can be made analogues of Spartan swordsmen. Just having a T3 fighter at this stage can greatly break the balance. Although I judge exclusively from fights against bots. Online games may show otherwise.
By chariots - this can be an interesting mechanic. A melee chariot could look interesting, and besides, it could only be used to move fighters quickly across the battlefield. Maybe it's worth making them "empty" by default, and giving players the opportunity to plant soldiers in them themselves? Or make an improvement? once mechanics are possible. But there is a problem here - overlapping models on top of each other. Now the models go into each other, which looks very bad.
For companies, most likely yes, there are not enough models. You can go for a simple option - as in the old games, just take the models of ordinary units in maximum pumping and add something to them, such as flags, flags, changing the colors of clothing and armor, etc. So you can make officers or generals there.
Heroes can be left as is, just work on the balance of faction bonuses and bonuses. As I wrote above, the game has problems with this. Because historical features can set a very narrow scope of possibilities.
You can go the other way - choose, conditionally, 5-10 bonuses, economic, attacking, defensive, etc. and balance them. Then give each hero 1-2 abilities, depending on their strength. Without getting attached or little attached to the story.
In some mods or games, each faction may have sub-factions, development options. For example, depending on the chosen hero from the Kushites, I could get a discount on the elite infantry of the temple of Meroe and pikemen, and choosing another one - a discount on cavalry. The third one can give a bonus to the defense or attack to the soldiers around.

[Stan`]

1 hour ago, guerringuerrin said:

I think this needs a necessary patch. Most of the ppl wouldn't play the community mod even it's a good idea. Is that hard to make a patch that fixes this without the need of compile a whole new release?

 

That's the community mod. Else it's a whole new release. No in between. 

 

[guerringuerrin]

18 minutes ago, Stan` said:

That's the community mod. Else it's a whole new release. No in between. 

 

Then we need to persuade all people to start playing it right now

[alre]

1 hour ago, guerringuerrin said:

I think this needs a necessary patch. Most of the ppl wouldn't play the community mod even it's a good idea. Is that hard to make a patch that fixes this without the need of compile a whole new release?

on windows, a mod is as easy to install as a patch, using the pyromod file. maybe the pyromod version of the community mod could be linked in the main site and dubbed "balance patch" or something like that.

[Lion.Kanzen]

11 minutes ago, alre said:

on windows, a mod is as easy to install as a patch, using the pyromod file. maybe the pyromod version of the community mod could be linked in the main site and dubbed "balance patch" or something like that.

is what I have been saying in the post about mod balance.

Ideally, it would nice if this work independently of the mod manager.

[guerringuerrin]

17 minutes ago, alre said:

on windows, a mod is as easy to install as a patch, using the pyromod file. maybe the pyromod version of the community mod could be linked in the main site and dubbed "balance patch" or something like that.

good idea!

[Stan`]

29 minutes ago, alre said:

on windows, a mod is as easy to install as a patch, using the pyromod file. maybe the pyromod version of the community mod could be linked in the main site and dubbed "balance patch" or something like that.

Sure where ? I also plan to post a message on the lobby advertising it when you open the lobby. Thoughts about wording?

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

5 minutes ago, Stan` said:

Sure where ? I also plan to post a message on the lobby advertising it when you open the lobby. Thoughts about wording?

At the top of the forum would be one good place (where the blue download ribbon currently is).

[Lion.Kanzen]

in the right corner on the main screen there should be a button that says: update now.

The game would seek to update the balance patch from there it would install it in the mod folder.

Similar to a mod.

1 minute ago, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

At the top of the forum would be one good place (where the blue download ribbon currently is).

It should be advertised everywhere.

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

9 minutes ago, Lion.Kanzen said:

in the right corner on the main screen there should be a button that says: update now.

 

yep. Maybe for Alpha 27

[alre]

16 minutes ago, Stan` said:

Sure where ?

I was thinking at https://play0ad.com/download/.

16 minutes ago, Stan` said:

I also plan to post a message on the lobby advertising it when you open the lobby. Thoughts about wording?

ABSOLUTELY! I requested this months ago! I hope for something undertandable by any player who comes up in the next months and must understand why all games are greyed out.

[Lion.Kanzen]

15 minutes ago, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

yep. Maybe for Alpha 27