15 replies to this topic

[Wijitmaker]

The Showcase Gallery is where the team will periodically showcase an aspect of the game for our community. These aspects may include: units, maps, maptypes and biomes, nature, structures, features and abilities, or civilisations. Each showcase will include high resolution art and a detailed description of the subject being presented. Comments and Criticisms are welcome here or on the public 0 A.D. Discussion Forums!

• New [1 October, 2008]! Unit Type: Celts Heroes
  
• Gameplay Feature: Resources
  
• Unit: Liby-Phoenician Pikeman
  
• Unit: Spartan Hoplite
  
• Structure: Civilisation Centre
  
• Unit: Anusiya
  
• Unit: Hoplite
  
• Unit Type: Hellenes Heroes
  
• Maps: Biomes Overview
  
• Gameplay Feature: Charging and Running
  
• Unit: Macedonian Pezhetairoi

Edited by Mythos_Ruler, 30 September 2008 - 04:55 PM.

[Herodotus]

why is the spartan feature charging and running? what the spartans did was held a line, spears out, and slowly walked forward,. if someone doged the spears, the people behind would stab, so the spartans pnly ran in training.

[Mythos_Ruler]

Neither the "Charging and Running" nor the "Spartan Hoplite" showcases feature running Spartans. However, Spartans will be able to run and charge in the game. The Spartans did in fact charge the enemy lines in a phalanx vs. phalanx battle in the last 50 yards or so of the attack. The point was to break the enemy phalanx in as devastating encounter as quickly as possible. Many times in Spartan history the enemy broke and routed before the lines even came into contact.

[jonnyreb]

proving my ponit that their should be a routing feature in all the units ... say the celts see the spartians marching up and like their attack and stuff goes down more and more as the spartians are in their los intill they try to run away , the spartians probley would only move if a herd of ar elphants carged them lol but like a routing feature would greatly make it seem more realitisic

[Mythos_Ruler]

Imagine the frustration of the player whose units refuse to accept attack commands. :S

[HistGamer]

Well yeah , it is frustrating for the player not to be able to control his army, but its reality, its more realistic to have units withdraw, rout and run away... and i guess u guys are putting a lot of effort in the "realistic" aspect?no?
Great work as usual but...

[Mythos_Ruler]

You have to realize the difference between an RTS game like Age of Empires or 0 A.D., and a Real-Time Tactical game, like Rome:Total War. In an RTS the player is not a general - the player is a god, guiding the actions of everything the player sees. It is up to the player to feel the emotions and to make the decisions on the battlefield, not the AI. What I mean is, in an RTS the player is the one that makes his units "rout" and run away by affecting a tactical withdrawal from the area of combat to regroup. That most players don't do this is not a failure of the RTS system, it's the failure of those players. Good players know when to retreat, reform, and attack. That's the kind of game we are designing. And in our design, the player has additional incentives to do just that, with units that auto-upgrade (citizen-soldiers) with battle and lifetime experience, and real formations that affect the outcome of battle. How formations are relevant to this discussion is that when formations fall below a certain number of units, the formation "breaks", the units become a mob, and the benefit of that formation is lost. The player can choose to let those units die in a heroic last defense, or choose to withdrawal them in a hasty retreat. Those decisions are left up to the player because of the genre in which our game is designed to fit.

Edited by Mythos_Ruler, 23 September 2008 - 04:49 AM.

[feneur]

You just made me understand a bit more about what we're doing here Michael Great explanation, not sure I've thought about it that way before.

[Mythos_Ruler]

Thanks Erik.

To clarify, I'm not saying RTT features can't be implemented into an RTS game. In fact, my ideal strategy game takes elements of RTT, RTS, City-Builders, and MMOs and melds them into one coherent game design in my head. But as far as 0 A.D. goes it is a strict RTS. RTSs play a certain way and that's the gameplay we're trying to emulate. Having direct command and control over one's units is a fundamental precept of the RTS genre. Fundamental.

[feneur]

Oh no, we're fundamentalists



(I know that fundamentalist can mean a lot of things, but unfortunately it's got a really bad sound to it nowadays =) )

[Justinian]

One question:
Will higher level troops have better formations?

[Mythos_Ruler]

I've thought of that before, but then what happens when you select a mix of units? You could only use those high level formations if you had 100% elite soldiers.

[saxguy]

will there be any soldier skill division as in the elite veterans on the back and the new recruits on the front?

[Banoffee]

You should release some more of these.

[Exüberance]

Are the heroes going to have high pierce armor to prevent them from being instantly taken down by a group of archers?

[Mythos_Ruler]

Yeah, heroes will inherently have higher pierce armor.