18-03-2002 22:35									#61
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I think Yin is looking for something on the lines of Warlords Battlecry. In WBC, you have mines and as long as you control them you get the resources. If you want more production out of a mine you add more workers (up to a limit). No more micro-management. You do have to protect them, because your opponents can take them over.

Of course, I may have misread Yin's comments.

	19-03-2002 00:26									#62
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Right, along those lines. And to restate: I really like the way you have to claim land in Disciples 2. It's simple, elegant and strategic. And you could still show the villies moving around, but why should I have to micro all of them?

Micro-ing villies is a challenge of dexterity not mental acuity (well, Mr. Fixit and others would occasionally run up the 'villie second' spreadsheets). Mind you, games demanding dexterity are fine and all, but we have plenty of those. RoN has an unsurpassed chance with Brian at the helm of FINALLY bringing us a superior 'Civ-like' game but in manageable and satisfying real-time.

Certainly my dream for many, many years...(Empire Earth didn't pull it off, IMO).

	19-03-2002 00:33									#63
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It isn't easy to find a alternative to villagers (even the next Command & Conquer will use them.) Controlling single mines would be one option,another idea would be to have the map devided into areas with a flag in the middle of it. The player who controls the flag, controls the area with all the mines in it. This system is used in "Z".
The problem is that both systems will lead to massive rushing since the player who controls ost of the mines ASAP will usually win the game.

	19-03-2002 01:59									#64
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One way to deal with that is to make considerable morale penalties when fighting on enemy land -- you can still take his territory, but you'll need markedly more (or more advanced) troops to pull it off. While this could lead to some long see-saw battles, the better player will still win ... with proven skill. Rushing, on the other hand, while not totally unrelated to skill level (rushing can be quite hard and risky to do), ends in games that aren't enitirely satisfying -- often even to the winner.

	19-03-2002 20:44									#65
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Penalties for fighting on enemy land could make things even worse. I am especially thinking about the beginning of the game here... each player will just try to grab every piece of land he can get his hands on. Then once the starting rush is over the one with most of the land will have a great advantage especially if the enemy will get penalties when he attacks that large territory.

Last edited by chronocrator on 19-03-2002 at 20:53

	19-03-2002 22:11									#66
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Land grab and rush are not the same thing. If you don't go out and establish your claim over important parts of land *and* keep control over them, you deserve to be at a disadvantage. Turtles should never have an easy time, IMO. But in the early game, a guy who just willy-nilly grabs up a bunch of land won't have any hope of holding it all. Keep in mind that to reclaim that land for yourself, all you'd have to do is whack his unguarded flag there a few times.

Rushing, however, means killing the guy on his home turf within the first few minutes of the game.

	19-03-2002 23:21									#67
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Since this game will span 6,000 years of human history, it might be interesting to add some "spice' to the game by adding "Wonders of the World".

Give all the civs something to work for: these Wonders could bestow added benefits on the civ that built them (such as extra gold, production, advances, etc). These Wonders could also be captured.

But give these Wonders "physical presence" and beauty: such as the Great Pyramids, Stonehenge, Great Library, etc. . .

Entertain us, yes; but also inspire us - give us something that will "massage our imaginations". . .

Last edited by Leonidas on 20-03-2002 at 00:20

	20-03-2002 03:06									#68
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quote: Originally posted by yin26 Land grab and rush are not the same thing. If you don't go out and establish your claim over important parts of land *and* keep control over them, you deserve to be at a disadvantage.

True, and my point was that the player who grabbed all that land will have it easier to defend it if the enemy gets a penalty for fighting on it.


Nice pictures, Leonidas! Since Civ AoE and EE have wonders I'm pretty sure we're going to see them in RoN, too. I just hope, they'll give the player some cool advantages like in EE.

	20-03-2002 04:05									#69
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quote: True, and my point was that the player who grabbed all that land will have it easier to defend it if the enemy gets a penalty for fighting on it.

As well he should! And remember: The flag claiming the land has no attack value...

	20-03-2002 21:22									#70
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Here's an idea that could help. Include something similar to Civ3's culture but with a twist. In Civ3 culture is used to expand borders and it is the only way to do so, except for capturing enemy cities. In RoN the player should be able to expand borders with the help of the army or other units (no matter if a system with flags is used or not) but he has to back it up with culture.

more culture -> higher unit morale
bigger territory -> lower unit morale

So if a player wants to maintain a huge empire he needs quite a lot of culture, while small countries with little culture have the same unit morale. IMO this would be a good system since it would make rushing harder and even give smaller nations a chance. A once great nation that is almost defeated and has just the capital (with many buildings and culture) left would have a really high morale which is realistic and good for gameplay IMO.

	20-03-2002 22:43									#71
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Yes, something like that. The overall idea being that *something* should be done to make attacking the guy on his own turf in the first few minutes of the game much, much more difficult. Culture and expanding borders could work in that you'd need to spend quite a sum of money to build it up. I think I would add a twist to your twist in that when your borders expand, you get to click on the quadrant into which they move, so that there is some strategic element to it all.

I wonder, though, if simply placing flags --which perhaps you only gain as an element of culture?!!!-- might not allow the player more strategic control?

Still, we seem to share the same goal...

	21-03-2002 03:01									#72
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I don't know if you understand me correctly. Units and not culture expand the border / place flags! But culture is needed to secure these gained areas because only with enough culture will units work efficiently.

more culture -> higher unit morale
less culture -> lower unit morale
bigger territory -> lower unit morale
smaller territory -> higher unit morale

So if a player needs a higher morale he will have to stop expanding and build up some culture (again: unlike in Civ3 units expand the empire).

	21-03-2002 06:20									#73
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I understand you, but you shouldn't penalize a guy for having lots of territory. If he claimed it AND held onto it, he deserves to reap the reward. Now, a cool way to get at what you are striving for is to have the length of time a section of land is owned give correlating bonuses...to some reasonable maximum.

	21-03-2002 19:22									#74
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quote: Originally posted by yin26 Yes, something like that. The overall idea being that *something* should be done to make attacking the guy on his own turf in the first few minutes of the game much, much more difficult. Culture and expanding borders could work in that you'd need to spend quite a sum of money to build it up. I think I would add a twist to your twist in that when your borders expand, you get to click on the quadrant into which they move, so that there is some strategic element to it all. I wonder, though, if simply placing flags --which perhaps you only gain as an element of culture?!!!-- might not allow the player more strategic control? Still, we seem to share the same goal...

ok yin, i know these games arent supposed to be history simulators, but sometimes looking at history can give us some insight into the issues involved.

We dont like rushes? why? well because it unbalances gameplay, but also because we sense its unrealistic - real like was more balanced, Sumer in 3500 couldnt just build bronze age warriors and crush egypt. So something was going on that enabled civs to survive, even when others had miliatry/technologocal leads. Artificial limits to rushing, or bonuses for fighting on home turf may mimic that, but is worth asking what was really going on. Obviously there were no rules in real history that said "no conquest till gunpowder" Maybe it was culture, or some home turf advantage? I doubt this - Egypt WAS conquered by outsiders, later when its culture was stronger. And akkadians with a culture that was derivative from Sumerian had no difficulty conquering SUmerian cities. Bronze age civs simply didnt have the kind of nationalism we think of today, leading to guerilla resistance. (well maybe china did, though i dont think so, certainly the near eastern civs did not) So what did stop ancient "rushes" Logistics and command and control. While it may have been easier for a pre-gunpowder army to keep supplied, since it could live off the land to some degree, this was not necessarily easy, especailly in an ancient world where few areas had large food surpluses. Command and control was also a dilemma - If I march with my army to Egypt, can i be sure that the rival sumerian cities wont revolt while Im gone? until issues of administration and supply had been resolved, at least to some degree, it was difficult to conquer or even raid beyond a certain distance. So it would have been possible to rush your close neighbors, but difficult to impossible to rush the more distant ones.

Yet all these games lack the grognard expedients of explicitly modeling army supply or command and control. These feature are too complex and "unsatisfying" for mass market games. Therefore we can either allow rushes, or introduce rules with various degrees of arbitratriness to prevent them. This is not to say that logistics or command and control SHOULD be introduced to such games - merely that when designing the work arounds, it is useful to understand the underlying phenomenon that did this in the real world.

LOTM

	21-03-2002 20:58									#75
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Actually, supply and support would be great concepts to add to a game like this. If you do a rush build, but can't afford to keep paying and feeding and resupplying ammo for you troops, they should desert or at least suffer the combat consequences of having bad morale and inadequeate equipment.

	21-03-2002 22:18									#76
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Like LOTM pointed out there are no really good models for supply and support. They are either too simple (supply vehicle with unlimited supply) or they demand too much micromanagement. IMO BHG should rather focus on good diplomacy options and a good trade system than on supply of the troops (everything is not possible since that would really be to much micromanagement for an RTS).

And yin I don't think you really understand me, it is possible to have a large territory without getting a penalty, the player just needs more culture than a small nation would need.

	21-03-2002 23:31									#77
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quote: the player just needs more culture than a small nation would need.

Well, looking at Civ3, I want nothing to do with 'culture'!

	22-03-2002 17:32									#78
	Avatar Enlargement: We've got the solution

Even a simplistic supply model would be better than none. Even an old style upkeep model (say like Civ's or SMAC's) where you have to continuously pay for your units, will keep troop sizes down to what your empire can really afford.

I disagree with the statement that supply hasn't been adequately done before. Many of the computer wargames dealt with this in a totally automated way (no micromanagement, unless you did something stupid and needed to correct it). No RTS has ever done this to my knowledge.

	22-03-2002 19:52									#79
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quote: Originally posted by yin26 Well, looking at Civ3, I want nothing to do with 'culture'!

I just used the term to give everyone a general idea what it is similar to, I suppose you could call it 'influence', too.
It could look like this: Every building under a player's control has a certain influence/culture (some more, some less). Influence does not build up like in Civ3. If the player gets a larger territory he needs more influence to maintain it - he has to build more towns with buildings.

Warpstorm: I've never played an RTS game with a good supply system, then again I've not played many wargames. So you must be right.

	22-03-2002 22:52									#80
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For a new and intersting supply suystem, you could check out Cossacks.

You would lose food at a rate proportional to the number of people you had. You would also lose other resources like iron and coal if you had ships. Then, if a ship or gun fired, you would lose iron and another resource for every shot.

Like I said, it was interesting, but not necessarily all that fun. Especially when all of your villagers started "dying from starvation". Really though, the game was just plain hard, and I shouldn't just blame the supply systyem.

	26-03-2002 10:59									#81
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Hi Brian! I bought AoE a while ago because I was expecting a grand, epic empire-building game. Something like Civ, but in real-time. Boy was I disappointed! After a couple of games, I realized that AoE is really not an empire-building game: you build one city, maybe two, but not an actual empire. Well its seems that RoN will finaly deliver the goods! I'm a bit concerned, however, about the potential micromanagement nightmare. And I'm not the only one: others have voiced similar concerns in this thread. Imagine playing AoE or AoK with 10 to 15 town centers!

Another thing bothered me about AoE: it's a tactically shallow game. IMO it rewards the Henri Fords out there, not the Rommels. I'm glad to hear that RoN promises to be a much deeper game on the tactical level. Great news!

One more thing. I would like to see the bastard's face whose kicking my butt in a game. It would create an emotional link. This technique was used with great effect in a game you may have heard of: Alpha Centauri. All the faction leaders had a face and a personality. Some of them even had an attitude problem! Take Yang for instance: I hate his guts. Who can say the same for the AI leaders in a SP game of AoE? I don't even remember their names! (I hear though that you can meet the likes of Yang in MP.) I would implement it this way: if you're trying to strike a deal with Napoleon, for example, a small 3d portrait of him would appear at the bottom of the interface. He could even have different reactions. Moreover, it would be cool if players could control the reaction (evil grin, shocked, smile) of their leader's portrait in a MP game.

	29-03-2002 18:45									#82
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I just thought I'd post that:

quote: from the RoN Pantheon: Resources work this way: Peasants do not "carry" and "deposit" resources as in other RTS games. Once you assign a peasant to a resource collector, they gather a steady stream of the resource. This reduces the micromanagement required to deal with peasants. So the first number is the amount of resources being collected over time, i.e., +150. The second number is your "commerce cap", which tells you how much you COULD be collecting if you had enough peasants and resource collectors. So a reading of +50 / 150 metal means you are producing 50, but you COULD be producing 150 if you had enough peasants. The second number goes up over time as your technology and building infrastructure increases. If your reading says +150 / 150 (and it would then be blinking as a visual cue), it means you are maxed out and need to research more commerce techs or build more of the appropriate building.

This systems doesn't seem bad since it eliminates quite some micromanagement. But from what I understand the player now just has to protect the place where the resources are gathered and not the place where they are dropped off by workers or the route they take to go there.

	30-03-2002 00:19									#83
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Couple answers/responses to things that have come up--

* Getting resources (e.g. Metal from Mines) is definitely based on controlling territory. There is an ultimate limit on how fast you can gather metal from any one mine (based on the size of the mountain it services), and it doesn't do you any good building a bunch of mines next to the same mountain. If you want more metal, you'll need to go take over more territory.

* If you don't want to micromanage your workers, the Auto Peasants option is MUCH more advanced than what you're used to in most games. I often just pump out some peasants in a town, and let them figure out what kind of gathering to do.

* Villages and Forts are used to claim and control territory. If you just build up in one city, you won't control much territory. But of course undeveloped villages are pretty weak and easy to take over, so there's a tradeoff. The Russians have a fun ability (Russian Winter) that causes damage to all enemy units in their territory--a good nation if you don't like to get rushed, but of course you have to take over territory in order to have it cause people damage.

See ya,

Brian

	30-03-2002 03:43									#84
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Well, those are some promising tid-bits. Sounds like you view the standard RTS fare as needing less micro in favor of more strategic/tactical thinking. Thanks, Brian.

	30-03-2002 16:21									#85
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Thanks for the replys Brian.
Many good things coming.

Now I just would like to once more advertice your Colonization game.
(It really is a good game - like it a lot.)

Now I would like to hope that you somehow implement a rule "One city cann't do everything" - like in Colonization. Thus forcing the player to expand and build a few cities at miniumun and to deside what each city is to do.

	02-04-2002 22:23									#86
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Yes Brian, RoN is sounding better all the time. . .

I hope that you can provide us with a separate upgrade screen to allow us to tinker with changing a unit's armour, sword, shield, gun, etc. . .

Maybe the upgrade screen could be similar to SMAC, HoMM 3 or similar games. I love this sort of thing. . .

	03-04-2002 18:01									#87
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quote: Originally posted by Brian Reynolds * Villages and Forts are used to claim and control territory. If you just build up in one city, you won't control much territory. But of course undeveloped villages are pretty weak and easy to take over, so there's a tradeoff. The Russians have a fun ability (Russian Winter) that causes damage to all enemy units in their territory--a good nation if you don't like to get rushed, but of course you have to take over territory in order to have it cause people damage. See ya, Brian

I really liked Z: Steel Soldiers concept of having to gain territory to get resources. In that case your income increased as you controlled more territory areas and each area was worth a certain amount so certain areas became hotly contested 'cause they were so valuable. You had to balance how much you could expand and defend at any one time. It encouraged early fighting which I think is a good thing in an RTS. Unfortunately hardly anyone played the game so I never really got to play it MP.

	04-04-2002 21:47									#88
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I dont know about the rest of youll. But i would like to see seasons in the game. Also treaties would be very cool to have in the game. I cant wait for this game to be out.

	04-04-2002 21:55									#89
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If this isnt already in the game i think biological weapons should be added to the game. You could find a way to balance the bio weapons as you did the nuke. Ive always wanted a game with bio weapons in it. Please have this in RON.

	12-04-2002 02:24									#90
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Just an AI that actually launches coordinated attacks.

Dave