FOR AN OVERVIEW OF THE CLASH PROJECT - READ THIS

Mark_Everson · June 20, 2002, 18:15

Hi Straybow:

I gotta admit its unbalancing, but it seems somewhat realistic to me. What is is about it that you consider it bad historically?

LDiCesare · June 21, 2002, 04:37

I think Straybow says Spain held Gibraltar thus they could have forbidden Venice from crossing the straits. A naval picket (I guess they had both fleet and artillery on land) locked Venice inside the Mediterranean. A blockade system would be needed to represent that. I think that putting lots of ships in the straits would do the job, though we are far from implementing naval fights (particularly supported from shore) now. We don't even have a model for this.

Straybow · August 29, 2002, 23:24

Blockades require separate combat rules, given limited room to maneuver and other factors. If the force holding a straight has some threshold level of strength it becomes very expensive to break through because the attacker can't bring his full strength to bear. The English Channel was too narrow for Spain's large fleet of slow deep hull ships (another factor most strategic games ignore) to fight effectively.

LDiCesare · August 30, 2002, 02:42

Straybow, could you cross-post that into the current Military Model thread (VI)? It has better chances to be found when we implement naval combat rules, which should (hopeiully, if everything goes well, and lots of additional conditionals) not be that far (I am being precise here) in time.

Mark_Everson · January 18, 2003, 12:32

Che and I have conspired to update the Project Status page on the web page. Its only been ignored for a year or so :0 ! As usual if I've screwed up in matching people to tasks in any important way, let me know and we'll get it fixed up.

I've now put a reminder on my calendar to update it every three months so potential recruits don't get the idea that we're not making progress.

vovan · January 18, 2003, 17:09

Looks good to me, Mark. Although I was thinking maybe you should consider revising the main page a little bit. On the right-hand column, where it says Key Milestones, maybe you should replace that with just news? After all, if somebody comes to the main page the way it is, they will see that the last 'signinficant' activity was in the middle of last summer, and they might not notice the link to the news section, which has been updated a little over a week ago. I mean if you want the users to see project activity right away, it might be a good idea to do that.

yellowdaddy · April 2, 2003, 17:55

my first post. I'm scottish, can speak a few languages, and am quite keen on realising a strong and DIFFERENT alternative to Sid Meier-type games.

i've already e-mailed Mark a bit, describing where i'm coming from... i'll elaborate further over time.

i have qualifications and experience in graphics and music. more to the point i designed a game a not unlike civ in theme, but quite different in style and structure about year before Civ 1 appeared. I have kept the idea shelved ever since, but i have some data, graphics and deep research.

the question is, is my game or ideas compatible with this game, i'm not sure.... some of them seem to be, but some maybe not... we'll have to see.

for a start, my map is quite different from any of the civ2 clones floating around, as are many other aspects. i don't like 3d isometric - i've read your earlier debate on this, i'm disappointed that so far your screenshots are of an isometric type - i will be putting a website together with a clearer presentation of my ideas, and some screenshots, which will be of a professional quality (without wishing too sound too arrogant!?!), but they will be overhead view, not 3d isometric. fortunatley in a way, most of the ideas i have that are radically different from things proposed have graphics to back them up.

the proof is in the pudding, so i will try an persuade with hard graphics and not just hot air.

i'm a bit bemused by this Java programming - what restrictions does this place on the game? as opposed to a C++ game? is this the kind of game you can play on your own as you would with Civ3 or something without the internet on, or ..?!

finally, i wonder what stage the game is at? i've downloaded something, but i don't know what to do with it!

have i posted this message in the right thread?!

i have to sign off now... back to my booze.

Jack McNeill

UK

Mark_Everson · April 2, 2003, 19:25

Hey Jack, welcome to the Clash forum

Originally posted by yellowdaddy
the question is, is my game or ideas compatible with this game, i'm not sure.... some of them seem to be, but some maybe not... we'll have to see.

Even if there are serious incompatabilities between your concept and Clash that doesn't mean there is no point to your potentially joining the team. You need to evaluate what positive aspects you would see with Clash from your perspective vs the liklihood of your dream game ever coming into existance through tremendous amounts of volunteer hard work. . .

the proof is in the pudding, so i will try an persuade with hard graphics and not just hot air.

yes indeed

i'm a bit bemused by this Java programming - what restrictions does this place on the game? as opposed to a C++ game? is this the kind of game you can play on your own as you would with Civ3 or something without the internet on, or ..?!

Relatively few restrictions. Just play the demo as discussed below and you'll see.

finally, i wonder what stage the game is at? i've downloaded something, but i don't know what to do with it!

Um, uh the most recent demo d/l is in the Demo 7 thread up top. There are links to directions for what to do to run it in that thread. If you follow the directions and get hung up, say in the D7 thread what you did and where you're stuck and we'll figure it out.

have i posted this message in the right thread?!

This thread is as good as any for your broad points. The graphics stuff would be better in the terrain or units graphics threads. For the best way to make suggestions or post comments read the "Suggestions" page off the main Clash web page.

i have to sign off now... back to my booze.

Hope you and the booze had a good time!

-Mark

Mark_Everson · October 12, 2003, 08:08

Hi All:

This thread could use a bump anyway so. . .

I'm going to be at a conference until Thursday. So if you email me with game stuff, don't be too surprised if it takes a while for me to get back to you.

-Mark

yellowdaddy · January 30, 2004, 19:31

what is a bump? and what does YMMV mean? (baffled of Dorset)

LDiCesare · January 31, 2004, 08:26

Bump: Action of unearthing a thread that sunk too deep (hasn't had any posting for a while).
YMMV: Your Mileage May Vary (also known as you may have a different opinion).

yellowdaddy · January 31, 2004, 14:49

if you're french, shouldn't you put something like "QQTP"? (quest-ce que tu pense?)

Gary Thomas · January 31, 2004, 15:31

This is a sticky thread - you don't need to bump it. The ones that need bumping from time to time are all the polygon threads...

Cheesr

wombat42 · February 1, 2004, 00:35

Or possibly "VPAVPA" (vous pourriez avoir votre propre avis). VPA squared.

wombat42 · February 1, 2004, 00:37

But I wouldn't lose sleep over it. Don't have to post in the mother-tongue... Besides, your English is impeccable. I would have guessed you're a native speaker. Still might be, despite the flag and the name.

yellowdaddy · February 1, 2004, 06:35

aye, well Scots English and a smattering of Gaelic anyway!

so I might go for DST? (De smaoinachadh thu?)

and I could always change my name to athairbhuaidh

yellowdaddy · March 28, 2004, 06:39

Could we have a project status report on the forum please?

Gary Thomas · March 28, 2004, 14:40

It is waiting on me to finish the save/restore, and I just got paint on my best trousers from painting the south wall of my bar. On the other hand, it rather appears that inland revenue are not going to send me to jail because I am too old.

Cheers

Gary Thomas · April 1, 2004, 15:43

I didn't mean to imply that IRD sends people to jail because they are too old. Actually it is my advanced age that has caused them to show an extremely rare burst of mercy. And mainly they don't think they can get all that money out of me anyway...

Cheers

LDiCesare · April 3, 2004, 13:53

Maybe if you didn't waste paint on your trousers you wouldn't have to buy so much paint and would be able to pay them?

Gary Thomas · April 3, 2004, 14:33

Hmmm. That's a thought. On the other hand, I would have to save 150,000 litres of paint to pay them, and I don't think I have quite that much on my trousers.

On the good side, I have 10 days off at Easter and intend to launch a severe attack on save/restore.

Cheers

yellowdaddy · April 3, 2004, 15:09

I have 3 days off at Easter to launch a severe attack some belgian chocolate Easter Eggs!

Stormbeard · April 7, 2004, 20:27

Original Post:

--
First off, hi, I've been lurking about the Clash Project for, er, a few years now ... In that time, I have occasionaly been trying (and failing) to get the Demo working on my W2k workstation.

So, since the topic of this thread is to create a thread more about Clash in general, and the project's orientation in general, I'd like to ask about the Licencing of Clash. I have failed to find a licence anywhere. This means Clash is Public Domain? That's dangerous.... (Did you know what happened to BSD? They had their code absorbed into Windows, with just a little mention deep in the code that no-one ever sees, and that windows is still copyright by Microsoft) You could have some corporation make an insignificant change to Clash, and claim it as it's copyright...

I would Suggest GPL or LGPL, but if you have reasons for staing away from Open Source, then tell me.

More posts coming *very* soon.
--

Now, Mark is right, this ought to not have been posted the way I posted it... I just forgot there was that main thread, but it *was* cluttered (the Clash Overview thread). It really ought to get cleaned up. (all those single-word bumps...)

Anyway, I have some general things about clash to discuss.

First off, I was under the impression that Clash was intending to be a game that would be able to random-generate a world. (See the Map Generator model on the website) and even liked the picture (Map Generator link under Screen Shots).

If this is so, then what of names. If Clash would create a whole new world for a game, then what would it do about Ethnic Groups, city names, and province names? Even in a scenario starting from a historically accurate time, there might be splinter groups according to the current models. Thus, you have things appearing during the game needing names.

If you follow the "traditional" approach (Using RL names) then you can have very strange and even misleading things happen. You could have the Russian Republic defending it's myriad of islands with triremes against the onrushing Aztec hordes or something...

Then there is the easy, boring approach: The great and Glorious civilization of EG002.

Or you could use random (or not quite random) groups of syllables. This gets interesting, because you could possibly program in a certain style for each language. For example the XacTec culture might name it's cities similarly (DacPak, LacPak, MoomPak, etc.), it's provinces another way (XacLos, XacMoom, XaxDac, etc.), and it's characters in another manner (Blort dos MoomPak, Port dos LacPak, etc.). This could get quite complicated- both a plus for immersion (in some ways) and a difficulty for coding...

You could also combine that with player interaction, so a player might input a preferred name ending (that could be an empty string), etc. There could even be a set deviation from the standard shown above..

I would have posted this elsewhere, but there didn't seem to be any single thread where this belonged, and it was pretty general.

I will discuss my Demo issues on the demo thread now (like a good boy

)

Mark_Everson · April 7, 2004, 20:52

Hi Stormbeard, welcome to Clash, and thanks for giving us your thoughts.

Originally posted by Stormbeard
(snip) I'd like to ask about the Licencing of Clash. I have failed to find a licence anywhere.
(snip)
I would Suggest GPL or LGPL, but if you have reasons for staing away from Open Source, then tell me.

All the code is CR the team. Perhaps we should have a license, but the current code is so far from the final version that it didn't seem necessary. I guess we should come up with one and put it in the d/l. We are not open source. This has been discussed often. Search under GPL Or "open source" if you want to see the discussions.

First off, I was under the impression that Clash was intending to be a game that would be able to random-generate a world. (See the Map Generator model on the website) and even liked the picture (Map Generator link under Screen Shots).

If this is so, then what of names. (snip)

I don't have a good answer for that one. We'll have to try some different approaches and see what people like. Personally I prefer real-world names, even if they don't match the geography.

I don't think we should discuss this in detail in this thread. How about in the "scenarios" thread? It is On the subject of scenarios.

yellowdaddy · April 8, 2004, 07:02

quote:
First off, I was under the impression that Clash was intending to be a game that would be able to random-generate a world. (See the Map Generator model on the website) and even liked the picture (Map Generator link under Screen Shots).

If this is so, then what of names. (snip)

I don't have a good answer for that one. We'll have to try some different approaches and see what people like. Personally I prefer real-world names, even if they don't match the geography.

Oh yes we do - one of my earlier posts... ... check it out.
http://apolyton.net/forums/showthrea...threadid=82813
specifically here:
http://apolyton.net/forums/showthrea...5&pagenumber=9

the solution was in summery:

have a fixed list of (at the last count) 72 Ethnic "peoples"
based mostly fairly accurately on the ethnolinguistic families of the Human race.

For each we have an equal vocab list for each language group to generate place names, and even people names.

there was also the proposal to have a bit of code which would simulate language evolution by changing consonants and vowels on the vocab list in a regularised way. New tribes and civs would take their names from people and places thus generated.

So, basically, Stormbeard, your idea has already been posted and tossed about by Laurant and I last year... so I'd see if you can convince him first...

btw, there is a thread called "the language thread" and it's not that old.