Cultures

[Stratego (dev)]

we would probably need at least double the number of current units

not at all

my plan was like AOK: all civs have same base units (swordsman, knight, archers,rams, trebuchets) about 90% of the units are same, and only the rest of the units are real civ units (eg. samurai for japanese).

[DreJaDe]

That's kinda immersion breaking on it's own or... I'm just not understanding things clearly.

I'm confused.

[Stratego (dev)]

when i made the game my vague plan was (i planned civs from the first moment - but it needed to wait when we have enough civ units)

The whole is based on AOK (Age of Kings - best game ever btw ))

eg. we make 4 civs (we can make more but for example)
- japanese
- briton
- frank
- norse

all civs have almost all default "civless" units (archer, swordsman, skirmisher, pikeman, ballista, catapult, trebuchet and so on)

all civs have their own specialities
a) maybe cheaper archers/pikes/knights
b) maybe faster moving archers/pikes/knights
c) maybe some instant/free techs (eg. ambidextria by deafult)
(maybe some negatives too )
d) not having gunpowder possibility to invent
e) or not having the top level catapult to invent

also civs have their special units trained in castles/factories or even in TC
eg.
- japanese samurai, chuko-nu
- briton longbowmen
- norse berserker or viking ship
and so on.

Moreover, we can tweak a little to being little more civlike:
- if a civ have a very good swordman like unit (eg. japanese samurai) we can make it being the unit in place of the "civless" swordmen. (so basically simply revoking the default swordsman from that civ)
- same for axemen: if norse have a better one, the civ version can be THE axeman of that civ.




this case i thought the balance is not THAT hard (as would be using clearly ONLY civ units in a civ)

[phoenixffyrnig]

my plan was like AOK:

What's this, the Age of Kingdoms I'm guessing, but what banner is it under? But yeah, if there were stock units then I agree, we wouldn't need to hugely expand current rosters. My gaming experience is fairly limited, but are you thinking along the lines of Age of Empires 2 where most factions had most units, some to a higher level than others - and sometimes not at all in certain lines - all to reflect the real historical focus of x y or z faction? If so, I like it (but with a togglable anything goes button too I think, for the times we want to play with everything, and to not alienate those who disagree / more importantly, those newer players who don't have all the necessary upgrades to have a focused playthrough).

also civs will have their own special extra attributes:

this is a really good plan - in fact, I would say crucial to this idea. Potentially even more than one attribute too, for example Viking longship could be made a lot more important, but obviously along with other specialities to account for non water maps.

Edit - I see you have answered most of my questions while I was in the process of asking them... chapeau

[Stratego (dev)]

yes Age of Empires 2 is literally the Age of Kings (AOK) as i remember

[b2198]

yes, that would be the point of civs.
also civs will have their own special extra attributes: like
- briton archer +1 range (or only +1 attack)
- frank cavalry will have eg. +1 armor or something.
- japanese melee units can have extra power
- nord axe weilding units can have extra
- some nation might have extra production capability maybe
and so on

we would probably need at least double the number of current units

not at all

my plan was like AOK: all civs have same base units (swordsman, knight, archers,rams, trebuchets) about 90% of the units are same, and only the rest of the units are real civ units (eg. samurai for japanese).

Yeah, this was what I was thinking would happen, but this still has 3 issues with it, that I mentioned in January here:

1. It's harder to balance: you have to make sure all cultures are balanced against all other cultures, or some games could be decided before they even started, due to one of the players playing with a culture that is "weaker against another one".
2. If something slips balance-wise in a patch, it's a bigger problem overall: if some culture-specific unit unintendedly becomes way stronger than it was supposed to in some patch, it's a much bigger problem because only players that are playing that culture would be able to make them, instead of any player making it back to compensate for the unbalance in a "not as bad" way.
3. Some cultures would without a doubt become stronger than others in some points of the game, like the primitives, for example, which would most likely be better early on, but bad later. This could create the problem that if you don't win the game with your culture when it's at its strongest (or at least don't get a significative advantage at that point), you probably lost already, even though you can continue playing, and this would both make match time culture-dependant, and also contribute to point 1 in that it'd be almost impossible for a "late game culture" to beat an "early game culture" with experienced players on both sides (or maybe the opposite, based on map size and TC count, it could get really volatile in that regards), so I think it'd be best to decide how much you want to focus on early, mid, or late-game inside the game itself, like it's done now, and probably in a increased way if/when Age Techs get implemented, by making a decision inside the game of how many factories you want to make of each culture, and having the possibility to adapt DURING the game (not beforehand) if your current culture factory distribution isn't working well enough.

we need to decide we want cultures or not.

currently the game is a mix of amyn cultures - that can be weird fighting together a samurai and a norse warrior

Can't we have both?

Implement culture assignment for units, but still allow culturless (null culture) games in map options?
That is imho the perfect solution to satisfy both:
- those wanting separated armies
- those wanting mixed armies


Besides strictly historically speaking, while those two examples are really out of place, many others are not.
Mixed armies were common.
Today enemy could have been tomorrow ally if it was beneficiary to both parties.

i updated earlier post.

"Can't we have both?"
also i dont even understand -> than simply we should not make cultures and keep only the mixed

why work on something that is not the game "spine" logic.

(also many double work on balancing both - and also implementing double things to be good for both)
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also as i said: it is out of "civilizations how to "question: as literally the "how not to" question. It can be decided later if we want a mixed - i dont like the idea btw.

I think this would be a way more viable solution to implement, by only really balancing the "null culture vs null culture" and leaving the others (that should be weaker) for easier campaign setup and for culture-themed games. I agree with Endru in that this would probably satisfy both parties.

Maybe paired with a new advanced option to let players choose "culture groups" as "any"(any player can pick any culture), "same"(all players will have the culture picked by the match creator) or "not null"(players won't be able to pick null culture in that match)

The problem with mix is that, it's way too powerful. And most people are just using the best of the best of each faction.

Limiting those now creates so much more strategy and go to build order. This addition of so much more strategy for me is something really great.

I disagree here, I don't think limiting creates more strategy, unless you meant limiting in-game, with the factory culture restrictions on units that phoenix mentioned. Limiting pre-game would actually reduce the amount of strategy by a lot, because you won't be able to choose from a wide variety of approaches to deal against some strat, with most cultures offering at least one of these approaches, instead, you will be limited to using only the approaches that your culture has against that, and in the (uncommon) case that it has none, you lose by default, because in that case you can't even copy the strat and try to outmanouver to win against it, because you can't use those units at all.

Granted, partial separation like what Stratego wants (and what AoE has) does lessen this issue A LOT, but ultimately still creates it, and we currently don't have that specific issue.

(but with a togglable anything goes button too I think, for the times we want to play with everything, and to not alienate those who disagree / more importantly, those newer players who don't have all the necessary upgrades to have a focused playthrough).

Yes, something like this I think would be crucial for this to be accepted by basically the entire community, by making it another form of playing the game, instead of just replacing the "mixed culture" one, which I'll admit is one of the things I liked the most in this game, and made me like it even more than something like Civilization, or Advance Wars, two of my favorite games of all time, and AoE, which i also like a lot (though probably not nearly as much as you do, Stratego), and have been playing since I was a kid (along with some other RTSs that are more separated in terms of "cultures", like Warcraft 3 and Starcraft 2, though in Warcraft 3's case what made me really love it wasn't the RTS itself, but the huge amount of very custom maps made by the community that made it sort of a collection of games).

[Endru1241]

i updated earlier post.

"Can't we have both?"
also i dont even understand -> than simply we should not make cultures and keep only the mixed

why work on something that is not the game "spine" logic.

(also many double work on balancing both - and also implementing double things to be good for both)
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I think cultural split is needed.

But, as I stated since the very beginning of any culture/nation/faction discussions - what is my most important concern is exactly balancing.
I cannot guarantee them being perfectly balanced, as I am pretty sure it's statistically impossible (or close to impossible).
I listed few possible future engine changes, that would allow better or easier balancing. Or just simply removed the need to create new units for many things. Those would decrease the chances.

Balance can be more or less determined for few cultures, but then if there is no way to set culture as imbalanced (turned off for multiplayer human unless ticked an option first or maybe just tagging unbalanced games), so adding any new culture is very big project.

With option to turn on mixed cultureless game new additions could have no culture, so not to throw off the balance, unless enough content is gathered to create new culture.
Plus when option for "old", mixed approach still exist, then no matter how much I mess with balancing - old play-through is still available.
And it can be played as fun reminiscence.
And players with wrong gem upgrade set feeling like being screwed have some option to continue playing without being deemed to loose every game (player having only some upgrades from various cultures).
And concerns about many things in map editor becoming impossible to set are removed (even if map maker places specific factory and adds specific units to buildlist - incorrect culture prevents production).

It can be decided later if we want a mixed

Later is often too late for those that would start feeling AoS ended being fun.
Besides I can more or less guess what later really means here.
There is a very old saying in polish about setting a date to do something:
"na Świętego Dygdy, co to go nie ma nigdy".
Literally it means "on the day of Saint Dygdy, that really comes never"
So something like "when the pigs fly".


What I am referring to is an option - not default, but something only shown in map settings.

Of course it is not perfect - it could become problem if any added unit or tech is also used producible there.
But it is not my first pick - first I wanted a full culture containing current set of units, which could have some later additions skipped.

If the image for this culture had two letters OP - I am pretty sure it would be much more understandable than U/C.
And such approach doesn't require any engine modifications.

[godOfKings]

I guess what we can do is start off with a much older asset pack with only non culture units, (or create a new pack with only non culture units) then from current pack slowly add the separate cultures and one unit at a time from each culture while balancing and replacing non culture units one by one... Also we have to get rid of redundant techs

[makazuwr32]

From my side i can say that multiple cultures balancing really will be an issue for aos.
I know how hard it is to balance 6 factions in aof.

[godOfKings]

But one good thing is that aos isnt like aof with completely different races, although there r differences but many things between cultures will also b similar so at least we can b happy that there r less things needed to balance than aof, which yet now is still not completely balanced for all races

[Stratego (dev)]

if many people want as option to have the "multiciv" civ to remain (where everything is in) we can do it - but i dont want to make it in android version as that would result many ui related coding (to let both and making any new options to select, fitting the buildlists accordingly, maybe the custom buildlists too - and so on)

so if this is strongly needed than we need to postpone the civs after unity version is ready.
(that was again stalling for months...)

[godOfKings]

If we have a perfect method to split up the cultures into balanced but different factions then i will support it and also accept removing the current mixed culture aos

[phoenixffyrnig]

so if this is strongly needed than we need to postpone the civs after unity version is ready.

Well nevermind, if it is some time away it al least gives plenty of time to think about the hows and whos and whats and grey areas, because as Endru said when opening this thread, it's a biggie!

For me, there's no downside to doing it like this (from a players point of view - obviously a whole lot of work when the time comes from DL and Dev point of view, but I think it would be a huge improvement of an already very enjoyable game).

Amongst other benefits, it could be useful for helping tidy up the tech tree - pages could be organised by things such as buildings, stock foot, stock horse, stock missile, x culture, y culture, z culture etc - I do still feel the whole upgrading process is very daunting for newcomers, so any improvement there would be useful indeed.

As has been mentioned above, this move would allow less upgraded players to be more competitive Vs fully upgraded - another big hurdle for our greenhorns.

If we have a perfect method to split up the cultures into balanced but different factions

It depends what we mean by balanced. If equal, not necessarily - if fair, then yes, definitely. Every race should have a chance of beating and being beaten by any other, but reliant on using the respective strengths and weaknesses. I think it's inevitable that their will be inequalities in certain aspects, as there was in history, but that will be part of the interest.

[Endru1241]

if many people want as option to have the "multiciv" civ to remain (where everything is in) we can do it - but i dont want to make it in android version as that would result many ui related coding (to let both and making any new options to select, fitting the buildlists accordingly, maybe the custom buildlists too - and so on)

so if this is strongly needed than we need to postpone the civs after unity version is ready.
(that was again stalling for months...)

first I wanted a full culture containing current set of units, which could have some later additions skipped.

If the image for this culture had two letters OP - I am pretty sure it would be much more understandable than U/C.
And such approach doesn't require any engine modifications.

This solution doesn't need any changes on UI.
I think maybe even none in the engine at all (unless current raceless setting has some specific code).
And later on UI could have some options to limit it (e.g. if more than 1 human player, then all players have to be of either AoS/All or of balanced cultures) or warn players it's potentially unfair.

I guess what we can do is start off with a much older asset pack with only non culture units, (or create a new pack with only non culture units) then from current pack slowly add the separate cultures and one unit at a time from each culture while balancing and replacing non culture units one by one... Also we have to get rid of redundant techs

That would be multiple times messier, than any idea of cultural split.
One reason is enough to warranty never employing it like that - potential crashes.
So all units already in game has to be in game.

From my side i can say that multiple cultures balancing really will be an issue for aos.
I know how hard it is to balance 6 factions in aof.

To be honest - your struggles with some balancing points made quite a few conclusions in my mindset about cultural split.

But one good thing is that aos isnt like aof with completely different races, although there r differences but many things between cultures will also b similar so at least we can b happy that there r less things needed to balance than aof, which yet now is still not completely balanced for all races

Actually with techs (or innate bonuses/penalties) potentially affecting all units it can be even harder to balance out.
Plus there is always a dilemma how to make cultural specific things useful, yet not too good.

The only way to ensure equal chances would be to nerf all cultural specific units to be always worse, than core units.
Although it can still hurt cultures without access to it.

Amongst other benefits, it could be useful for helping tidy up the tech tree - pages could be organised by things such as buildings, stock foot, stock horse, stock missile, x culture, y culture, z culture etc - I do still feel the whole upgrading process is very daunting for newcomers, so any improvement there would be useful indeed.

Yeah - that is an issue too.
Shop upgrades are mostly just in arrangement of their implementation time.
This is not good for newcomers.
But I am unsure how to sort it out with current 4 columns 6 items.

If we have a perfect method to split up the cultures into balanced but different factions then i will support it and also accept removing the current mixed culture aos

It depends what we mean by balanced. If equal, not necessarily - if fair, then yes, definitely. Every race should have a chance of beating and being beaten by any other, but reliant on using the respective strengths and weaknesses. I think it's inevitable that their will be inequalities in certain aspects, as there was in history, but that will be part of the interest.

I 100% sure making it balanced on first try is impossible.
That's why I am standing so strongly on the idea of having mixed one still in, while split cultures will be implemented.

If mixed approach won't be used it can be removed later on for multiplayer games.