Exilian
Game Design and Project Resources: The Workshops Quarter => Mods, Maps & Game Add-Ons - The Bazaar => Archimedes' Workshop - 0AD Mods & Maps => Topic started by: Jubal on November 04, 2013, 12:36:44 AM
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Okay, so this is one of those threads everyone hates where someone says "I have a cool mod idea but don't have time to do it".
Actually, more to the point in this case, I don't have a completed game to mod. But one day I hope this will come out of the pipeline, because it's an idea I've been kicking around for a while that fixes most of my biggest RTS bugbears.
What bugbears are these?
- the building of a city, as happens in an RTS, takes years in general. And local resources do not simply deplete in a linear fashion over decades; trees, for example, have a fantastic and exciting tendency to grow.
- cities don't actually exist in a vacuum, or even with just one connection to someplace like in AOE3
- When a city gets big, it gets busy. People live, work, love, die, etc, there. What definitely does not happen except in RTS games is that it becomes an empty shell where the populace spend all their time outside the city gathering natural resources and inside the city there are just a ton of troops.
So, what's the plan?
- The plan is essentially to have a lot of vital inner-city activities that bring the city to life, and to make resource gathering only part of the overall economy
- There are three strands to the idea: trade, resources, and city life
TRADE
- The major difference here will be trade points on the map whereby neutral traders will spawn and wander around visiting markets etc
- A "trade resources" counter added, with trade resources creatable with different new "city life" options
- Trade will become the major source of gold, but it will be in payment for goods or taxation on trade and not just money out of thin air for walking a donkey a mile and back
RESOURCES
- Trees/plants that grow or at least are far denser packed. Because, you know... trees do do the whole growing thing.
- More clumped but longer lasting mines, such that protecting gold mines is really important
- A lot of maps with no gold mines, so trade is vital from an early stage
CITY LIFE
- This will include needing to task workers on industries for them to function effectively (such as the blacksmith)
- Also far more things that need doing around the town - holding religious festivals and having market stalls to attract traders
- New citizen units; sophists for the Greeks, for example
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This sounds amazing :D .
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This idea reminds me of Stronghold.
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Took the words right out of my mouth Wolfy. :)