Version 0.9 progressing

[piranha]

We have some screenshots to show from some of the new things that are coming in version 0.9.

First is a screenshot from the editor showing some of the new terrain.

Screen Shot 2012-07-27 at 7.32.24 AM.png (587.36 KiB) Viewed 7762 times

Hatchfactory is helping out with art now. He is improving the current terrain as you can see on the new grass and improved hills that blend nicely into the grass terrain. He also created a beautiful wall terrain.
We have the river terrain as well but it's not ready for the editor yet. One other thing hatch contributed with is some tips on ways to shrink down the file size. Many files have been shrunk to 30-40% so I hope the overall art will be about 60% - 70% size in version 0.9 compared to current version including that we have new terrain.


The next screenshot is also from the editor.

Screen Shot 2012-07-27 at 7.35.31 AM.png (216.73 KiB) Viewed 7762 times

This is just the new map popup in the map editor showing the new map sizes and the new random terrain feature. It will not create a playable map but it's a step in that direction and it can be used to get some terrain to start out the map making from.


The last screen shot is from the community and the match making page.

Screen Shot 2012-07-27 at 7.27.33 AM.png (367.05 KiB) Viewed 7762 times

There is a new look to the community that is matching the rest of the game better. On the matchmaking page you can setup a criteria and it will search and match for games with those criterias. You can setup several at once and have them waiting to start a game. There are still some things left to do on the matchmaking but it's working quite well with what we have right now.

The real time activity is removed from the right side, instead you can see a online list there of all players that are logged on. You can click any of those players and send private messages to them. The current send message to your friend that are online system is going to be replaced with this one.

Snotling is currently working one the simultaneous turns option and we hope that this new chat option will make it easier to get real time games going when you can contact people directly.

[KGB]

I love the look of the new terrain. HatchFactory has done some great work there blending one terrain into another. If the rest blend that nicely it will look fabulous.

On the other hand the walls look great visually but unfortunately don't fit scale wise with the rest of the terrain (imagining them next to mountains and being bigger than those mountains or even bigger than cities themselves which have their own walls). Scale wise these look designed for a zoomed in version of the game where every individual man/horse/creature would be shown and a battering ram/catapult would literally knock holes in the wall to allow units to pass through.

I am curious how the random terrain feature works. Does it add cities/roads/sites etc? I have the code for the DLR and War4 random map generators if you are interested in taking a look at how they work in order to bunch like terrain together and place cities, run roads etc. Ultimately I'd love to see an actual random map generator for creating random maps for game play so that you aren't using known maps all the time.

KGB

[piranha]

Snow and desert are the tricker ones. There would have to be desert like hills and snowy hills to make it blend as well on those terrains. But it looks good with all the other terrains. Going from desert or snow to lush grass you would expect some sort of middle type terrain to get away from the sharp edge that we have now.

About the walls, I think there is a lot of terrain that doesn't work scale wise. Take the dock for example, but even a tree in the forest terrain is similar sized to mountains, it should be less than a pixel on the mountain side. Thing is if you want to have correct scales on everything maps need to be way bigger so some things can take many more tiles. A bit more like old school RPGs. Or modern large scale 3d RTS games that render entire armies in the right scale.
I don't think this type of game is suited for correct scales. It is something that have bothered me a bit but I can't see any way to get that part correct and keeping the same game.

Snotling will have to answer the random terrain question. But it does not place cities or roads, just nature features.

[KGB]

Piranha,

Going from desert or snow to lush grass you would expect some sort of middle type terrain to get away from the sharp edge that we have now.

What DLR had was edge terrains to do what you describe. So that at the edge of a desert/grasslands for example there would be 1 tile that would still be mostly desert but would have some spots of grass on it (about 25%) that still was a desert terrain. There was also 1 tile that was still mostly grass with spots of desert on it that was grass terrain. Then map makers selected which one (or both if they wanted a 2 wide blend) they wanted for their edge. You'd need that for all the various terrain types where you need to have such blending. It's not as many as you might think and if Hatch can do this kind of work it should be possible.

About the walls, I think there is a lot of terrain that doesn't work scale wise. Take the dock for example, but even a tree in the forest terrain is similar sized to mountains, it should be less than a pixel on the mountain side. Thing is if you want to have correct scales on everything maps need to be way bigger so some things can take many more tiles. A bit more like old school RPGs. Or modern large scale 3d RTS games that render entire armies in the right scale.
I don't think this type of game is suited for correct scales. It is something that have bothered me a bit but I can't see any way to get that part correct and keeping the same game.

I understand what you mean but these walls are WAY out of scale. Only the Dock is close to being that far out and it's only to show where you can enter/exit the water. The walls are multiple connected tiles potentially encircling dozens if not hundreds of squares.

More to the point, what is the plan game wise for them?
- Are they going to be some kind of barrier that you can (must if there are no gates) bash permanent holes in with siege units for a cost of X movement points?
- Can flying units pass over them freely since they are flying? What about Sandworms passing under freely as they do city walls? I think a different game mechanic than how city walls work is going to be very confusing.
- Can you guard them with units on top in the tower areas and get a defense bonus? Walls without guards are not going to stop armies, they just climb over them. Martins 900 foot ice wall doesn't stop wildlings from climbing over when there are no guards on top. Even in Warbarons empty cities with L8 walls don't stop armies from freely occupying cities so units must man those towers or once again you have a different confusing game mechanic.
- Will players be able to build them like they do the current towers? For that matter does this replace the current towers we have now?
- Are these walls neutral or do they always belong to a player. City walls obviously belong to the owner of the city. But these appear to belong to no one. So does the first person there get ownership of the walls so that you can then prevent enemies from LEAVING the walled in area as much as someone inside can prevent armies from ENTERING the walled area? It would certainly appear the walls can be used in both directions even if the graphics don't make it look that way.

My point is I don't see what they are going to add game play wise that is going to make any sense given we already have towers, city walls etc in the game and well defined rules for how those work.

They really seem FAR better suited for:

1) A new map type that would feature ONLY zoomed in terrain with actual individual units where 1 city would be dozens/hundreds of squares and you could see individual buildings, streets etc.
2) You intended add a new feature of tactical combat instead of the current auto combat. There is a game called Age of Wonders that is a Warlords clone that featured turn based map play like Warlords and had tactical combat that zoomed into the level of detail like those walls show where cities were surrounded by walls and units had to break through with siege equipment/climb/fly over. The 2nd in the series called Age of Wonders-Shadow Magic is still very popular and well done. Tactical combat might be something that could eventually be added for Simultaneous games.

KGB

[jetigig]

To do tactical combat you would need everyone on at the same time, but if the players were in different time zones that would make it hard to play.

[Jeremy]

I'm afraid I agree -- the scale on the walls looks really weird. Note the huge gate, next to a tiny door in the same wall. My feeling is that walls should be about 40% of their current height

[LPhillips]

It seems to me that the crux of the idea is dependent on the usage of the walls. If they're of epic size, intended to block whole armies and even to slow fliers (think ridges) then it's about right.

I think the problem of "manned or unmanned" is much simpler than KGB is making it. Obviously this is not a game of micromanagement and scale troop deployment. It would be assumed that the large armies represented by the sprites cannot easily pass a significant wall in any timely manner, and it would also be assumed that the walls are guarded. Even if your army holds the wall, you're going to use the gate to pass through. The towers and such seem quite obviously to just be window dressing, while the gates can of course be manned by standing in them. The only question about manning is whether the gates would provide defensive bonuses, and whether more than 1 stack can occupy them.

If the walls are as previously discussed, then they are kingdom barriers like Hadrian's Wall. Of course there is no purpose to representing something the size of city walls; we already have that. This is far different from the guard towers or city walls, and I think if you miss that then you will miss the whole point. These will be used either to represent an epic feature, or to more realistically show a guarded mountain pass and such other features. Nothing is impassible, even mountains. However, a 30 meter high stone barrier stretching half a mile is not something you will ever attempt to scale with an army. It's also very important to remember how ancient siege weapons worked. It was not until the advent of gunpowder that siege weapons were able to do serious damage to a well built stone wall.

That's why we have the term "siege"; walls couldn't be bypassed. So even a 20 meter stone barrier with a few archers is an insurmountable obstacle in the time of catapults and battering rams. Rams were used on doors and launchers were used to toss things over walls, seldom to knock holes in them. No one ever took down ancient cities and forts by breaking the walls.

[LPhillips]

In fact, in the time scale of the game, it will make zero sense for armies to be able to create holes in these walls in one turn. Full control of the area and heavy equipment are needed, plus a labor force. All of these things are assumed in city reconstruction, and fire is used when you "raze" a city. Taking a section out of the Great Wall of China, for example, would have taken close to a month even with an equipped labor force.

[KGB]

LPhillips,

I still maintain that adding this is going to overly complicate the game by adding a new mechanism that we already have covered in the game. This new mechanism will end up with it's own rules that will run counter to what we have. Once again I say:

1) Empty City with L8 walls. Any army may freely occupy with no resistance. Clearly there are no defenders on the city walls defending it.
Your proposal for these walls. Some *defenders* of some kind auto defending that can't ever be killed. You never have to replace their losses, pay any upkeep for them, upgrade the walls or anything else so they are in effect free immortal defenders. Will they do some kind of damage against armies coming toward them?

2) City Walls/Towers. Can be built, upgraded, destroyed and convey a defensive bonus. There is a game mechanism in place for them already.
Your proposal for these walls. They can't be destroyed, they can't be upgraded, they can't be bypassed. They may or may not confer some defensive bonus (to be determined).

3) Ownership. Cities own their walls. Towers are owned by who is inside them. There is a game mechanism in place for them already.
These walls. Who owns them? They look neutral. It could be argued they keep armies IN as much as OUT. Maybe these *defenders* prevent armies going both ways (IN/OUT)?

4) Fliers. To capture a city they must fight the defenders. Hence they have to come into battle against the defenders in their walled towers so the defense bonus from such makes sense.
These walls. If you just want to fly past to a city beyond them they unless they were 1000's of feet high any flier would simply pass over without ever needing to fight anyone on the walls. There is literally nothing interesting there to capture so these walls are no impediment to fliers looking to fly past.

The graphics look great but they just have no place right now in the game as it stands. If you want some barrier than prevents armies (land/flight) from passing then the game would be FAR better served by adding a magical barrier on maps. It could be just some bluish colored vortex that you place on a map square to indicate it's got a magical barrier on it.


As for time scale. I tend to think of 1 turn = 2 weeks (or more). Anything less makes no sense in terms of rebuilding cities/towers, training armies etc. If anything, 1 turn = 1 month. So the idea that siege units would break holes in walls in 1 turn is VERY realistic. It takes far less time than you think to breach walls when there are no armies there actively defending it (I am TOTALLY against mysterious defenders guarding walls that you propose). The Romans build a massive ramp up (375 ft high) to Masada in 2-3 months time with only 4000 soldiers and between 4-10K slaves. You can see an great photo of it here (imagine that 400 ft high cliff as an endless wall)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Vista ... Masada.jpg

So a 20 or 30 ft wall (Great Wall of China) would have a ramp over in it in a week or two at most.

KGB

[Chazar]

Why not replace all cities by these walls? One could thus have cities of any size and shape, not just 2x2? A rich city might enclose 8 tiles, whereas a poor one might only enclose 1 or 2 tiles.

Of course, one would rely on map makers using this in a sensible manner.