A little message to Mr. Reynolds...

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Re: Re: A little message to Mr. Reynolds...

Originally posted by XarXo
FINALLY!! One has CLAIMED that CASTLES CAN'T BE DESTROYED WITH A BUNCH OF CAVALRIERS WITH SWORDS!! IS PROBABLY THAT IN THIS GAME WE CAN HAVE A RESISTANCE INDEX?? YES?? PLEASE!!!!!

I think castles should be a LOT harder to produce AND destroy than in AOE. According to some people I know who live in Germany, practically no castles were ever destroyed. If they're dead now, it's because of erosion. Castles were INCREDIBLY difficult to destroy and were VERY well defended. And I don't ever remember hearing about villages that had 4 castles, let alone 4 like in some AoK games I've played.
This all depends, of course, if BR intends on including castles.

Also, most building should be resistant to everything but Siege weapons, and wooden ones also susceptible to anything that is on fire (torchers, fire arrows, etc).

[Straybow]

Castle evolution

Castles evolved considerably over time. Early castles were not sophisticated. They often were assaulted by footsoldiers with simple seige weapons constructed on site, and in Europe these tactics were often successful. The key factor was manpower, and since feudalism kept forces small, alliances of nobles were required to muster the strength to assault.

In the NME isolated castles were not the norm, but rather large fortified cities with massive curtain walls. These could only be breached by concerted effort: sapping, heavy catapults, mobile seige towers, etc. But since armies were state controlled rather than raised by feudal lords this power could be brought to bear more easily than in Europe. Seiges required more time, sometimes a year or longer, but were often successful.

The Crusaders learned alot from NME fortress designs, so late Medieval castles became nearly invulnerable to simple assaults from feudal powers. The city of Albi was the home of "heretics" called Albigenses. The Dauphin (or somebody) gathered vassals and allies from most of France in order to assault the great walls. Lords who left their lands to participate were promised papal sanction against any who might try to seize their property in their absense.

One of the things I have not liked about Civ and successors/immitators is the requirement of separate seige engine units. If the Civ has the technology any army can construct small engines on demand, and large engines given time. In TBS game turns are easily long enough to make that factor immaterial. RTS units would just require a certain time to build their seige weapons.

[ravagon]

I don't really understand all of this hoohaa about attacking buildings. Buildings were attacked/razed/burned by guys stomping around with swords and axes. They didn't actually use their swords and axes for these tasks of course but after just hearing about how its the gameplay that actually matters I find it hard to believe that people would actually complain about an infantryman seeming to hack away at a building with a sword rather than sheathing it and using a burning torch instead. Thats just another example of unnecessary flashy graphics surely ...
Same thing with discarding a simple damage meter in the form of a health bar ... why?
Replacing this with more "flashy graphics" such that a player is able to discern the damage level by looking at the special effects is just what "strategy gamers" don't want - or so it seems from some of the above statements ...

[simwiz2]

I think buildings should be destroyed by fire which is caused by a unit's attack, rather than the unit's attack itself. A building's vulnerability to fire should be based on how much wood compared to stone (or iron in later ages i guess) is used to buuld it. So a 0 wood 650 stone castle would be invulnerable to fire, and would be INDESTRUCTIBLE to a bunch of guys with swords/torches. A 100 wood 0 stone lumber camp could be easily destroyed by swords/torches. Of course villagers should be able to put out fires (possibly more effective if near a well - another specialized building?) and repair any damage. And fire should be able to spread. And bombardment units should be able to start buildings on fire.

[One_Dead_Villy]

well the way they do it in cossacks is pretty good...
troops can only capture buildings...and only explosive and fire troops can attack buildings. they should use that method.

also in RON they have a capture city ability so i am sure its not all just able swords hacking on buildings...

i also agree with ravagon and simwiz...and also there is nothing wrong with making the game visually appealing.

Also they should make fortresses upgrable to better one still they get those near invulnerable castles, but it would just cost a lot of resoruces and time to upgrade to that.

[Kataphraktoi]

anything that hurts gameplay will be blindfolded and shot-Greg Street

the way they do it in cossacks is NOT good.you can simply run a few cheap units through the enemys town(sich cossacks work good) and cause villagers and buildings to join you(and you can quickly delete them to prevent your enemy from getting them back.)

wich is NOT FUN...

and i think using non-artillery units to kill buildings is fine.would you rather have your computer slowed down with all the graphics for making it look right(troops putting away swords,grabing tochers etc) or would you rather have them wack away at stone walls.....

[Alexander's Horse]

I agree with Jimmy - when are game makers going to learn that we want resources put into gameplay not eye candy.

[tniem]

Originally posted by Alexander's Horse
I agree with Jimmy - when are game makers going to learn that we want resources put into gameplay not eye candy.

My guess is they will sell more copies if the game looks better than AoM than if it is more strategic and more deep than AoM. Of course, I want a deeper more strategic game, but graphics always has to be a concern to the company for sales. In the end, good graphics does not have to be at the expense of good game play and that is what I am hoping with this one.

[FrostyBoy]

AH, sometimes resources requires eyecandy

[FrostyBoy]

A better way to say it: Eyecandy takes resources.

[Jac de Molay]

especially for us graphically challenged folk

[Sarxis]

All I have to say to Mr. Reynolds and his troupe is:

1). Be a fan of RTS games
2). Learn from the mistakes of your predecessors


RTS isn't a new genre, and there are plenty of resources in the fan-base, as well as other RTS games, that the BHG developers can glean from.