I used to play AOE and ROR heavily on the MSN Gaming Zone and then Voobly and took part in the last MrFixitOnline tournament back in the early 2000’s under my old nick TabooUmbeCSUK, so it’s fair to say that I’ve probably clocked up more hours than most and the simple reason for this was that it was and still is the best game ever made. These are the things that made it amazing and which I think should be retained:-
The Random Map Generator - was actually random, you could get an amazing starting position one game and an absolute horror show the next, the relatively symmetrical maps of AOK there were not. Getting a weird peninsula or spit of land surrounded by rivers on an otherwise land map would suddenly make having a fleet a necessity and woe betide you if Hittite Galleys got in their first (+4 range could dominate surrounding land). RTS in the last few years have leaned towards symmetrical unimaginative map types (yes StarCraft I’m looking at you) for esports/‘fairness’ purposes or because of conscious game design (Wargame Series). The exploration in ROR made it beautiful, there was a joy in uncovering a virgin world and deep strategy in adapting to your position (yay Shorefish/Double berries, arrggghghhh no food, will have to dock start). Only Nomad on AOE2 really got this feeling and this is popular game type in AOE2 so I hope the randomness is retained. The way to ensure it doesn’t screw up tournament play is to play best of 3 games or perhaps have an option for symmetrical maps. Build Orders are pretty lame (you won’t find a ROR strategy guide with build orders, you can find loads for AOK), true strategy is exploring and adapting to what you have got.
The interaction with the Fauna. Unlike in AOK where wolves were little real threats (particularly when you have the loom) and had poor animation the fauna in AOE was amazing. Lions were deadly, particularly in pairs, Lions would chase Gazelles, the gazelles could be herded (difficult) and elephants could be drawn to your TC with better animations than they ever managed in AOK for the boars.
The Fog of War/Writing. I used to love every multiplayer game starting with players calling out their position on the map like the hands of the clock and the requirement to get writing from the Government Centre to see what your allies were doing. Again, it made exploration vital and produced some epic ‘unexpected save the day’ moments when you are getting pushed back by enemy chariot archers and then suddenly at the edge of the field of view enemy chariots start collapsing under fire from the fog as allies stream into help. AOK turned its back on this heavily with Cartography becoming cheaper and with the Portuguese and Rise of the Raja civilisations getting sight bonuses. It made a far less immersive game. The Timeline was useful to see if someone was going to tool age fast and building a military.
Asymmetrical and unique balance. Eventually the online communities settled on 3v3 Random Map, Random Civ, Speed 1.5 usually Continental or Hills as the default game type, so it didn’t really matter massively what civ you got as normally it would work itself out, so if you got stuck with crappy Carthage normally somebody else on the team would get someone good like Assyrian to counter weight. Even the poor civs (usually those lacking either archers and/or econ bonuses, Greek, Choson etc) could pull off a Tool Rush (Persian really had to)
Graphics - I think the team have done a great job with updating these.
I agree with everything actually.
I recently installed the game again so maybe I find some things I can mention. (Long time since the last time I actually played AoE1 )
to be honest, I’d assume we’d all be happy with just the graphic and UI upgrade/updates. Have a classic mode and then maybe another mode that they can actively develop upon, as long as we get to choose whether we want new toys or the classic experience. Hopefully it doesn’t end up dividing the playerbase too heavily.
I never liked the fact that i only got 1 gold mine whilst the enemy got 2 of them. Having some sort of randomness would still be good.
forest isn’t close to base and not enough trees close by to make: granary + 2 houses + storage pit, made you change build order accordingly.
gathering food after founding your berry bushes was always different.
Not having same start is good for the randomness, but if you get whole game lasting disadvantage it isn’t fun.
leaving map style random has two sides.
Good thing is the fact that you have to explore map before you know what would be best strategy.
Bad thing is that taking naval heavy civilization and ending up in island map gives too huge advantage and promotes roll the dice play style.
There is for sure multiple styles to pick civilizations in ranked games. One of the most common is pick/ban style. 16 different balanced civilizations should be enough.
2 teams with 3 player each: (cannot pick same civ twice or pick same civ as enemy team)
Team A bans civ.
Team B picks civ.
Team A picks civ.
Team B bans civ.
Team A picks civ.
Team B picks civ.
Team B bans civ.
Team A bans civ.
Team A picks civ.
Team B picks civ.
I never liked the fact that i only got 1 gold mine whilst the enemy got 2 of them. Having some sort of randomness would still be good.
forest isn’t close to base and not enough trees close by to make: granary + 2 houses + storage pit, made you change build order accordingly.
gathering food after founding your berry bushes was always different.
Not having same start is good for the randomness, but if you get whole game lasting disadvantage it isn’t fun.
leaving map style random has two sides.
Good thing is the fact that you have to explore map before you know what would be best strategy.
Bad thing is that taking naval heavy civilization and ending up in island map gives too huge advantage and promotes roll the dice play style.
There is for sure multiple styles to pick civilizations in ranked games. One of the most common is pick/ban style. 16 different balanced civilizations should be enough.
2 teams with 3 player each: (cannot pick same civ twice or pick same civ as enemy team)
Team A bans civ.
Team B picks civ.
Team A picks civ.
Team B bans civ.
Team A picks civ.
Team B picks civ.
Team B bans civ.
Team A bans civ.
Team A picks civ.
Team B picks civ.
On point 4 you always used to agree the map type with Conti, Hills and Inland being most popular (Mediterranean was a bit niche) so wouldn’t have to worry about your civ choice and would often be mirrors. The Randomness on maps came about within the maps themselves, for example Continental might have narrows rivers nessecitating fords or it might not.
Most of the Naval civs were actually good on land (minoan, phoe, yamato).
The meta brings back a ton of nostalgia! I always played Hills myself, I have a massive dislike for all things water-related (in all RTS/strategy games…).
I pretty much agree on everything, but i think point 1 is the most important. The fact that the map was actually random was one of the best and most interesting facts. It could make you change your strategy onto another completly diferent direction.
@RekillsPT said:
I pretty much agree on everything, but i think point 1 is the most important. The fact that the map was actually random was one of the best and most interesting facts. It could make you change your strategy onto another completly diferent direction.
It should be random but they should ensure certain things for PvP 1v1 for example starting berries and gold should be the same amount and within a certain distance of your base, unobstructed. A huge disadvantage to one player at the start is no fun for anyone…but one player having a lake, or strategic defensive position, or an extra resource is fine.
@AssyrianAxeman said:
Honestly i always liked Coastal (Im an oddball okay.) A blend of water on three sides with land. Loved it in aoe 2 and in aoe 1 ^^
I really like coastal and highland, but highland could be really imba even in AoE2…like my last highland game in AoE2 I had only 1 relic on my side and all the other relics were positioned on the other side of the river and I would have needed to go through his FOV to get to them.
@RekillsPT said:
I pretty much agree on everything, but i think point 1 is the most important. The fact that the map was actually random was one of the best and most interesting facts. It could make you change your strategy onto another completly diferent direction.
It should be random but they should ensure certain things for PvP 1v1 for example starting berries and gold should be the same amount and within a certain distance of your base, unobstructed. A huge disadvantage to one player at the start is no fun for anyone…but one player having a lake, or strategic defensive position, or an extra resource is fine.
For what i can remember you always had a minimum from each resource near your starting point.
I used to play AOE and ROR heavily on the MSN Gaming Zone and then Voobly and took part in the last MrFixitOnline tournament back in the early 2000’s under my old nick TabooUmbeCSUK, so it’s fair to say that I’ve probably clocked up more hours than most and the simple reason for this was that it was and still is the best game ever made. These are the things that made it amazing and which I think should be retained:-
The Random Map Generator - was actually random, you could get an amazing starting position one game and an absolute horror show the next, the relatively symmetrical maps of AOK there were not. Getting a weird peninsula or spit of land surrounded by rivers on an otherwise land map would suddenly make having a fleet a necessity and woe betide you if Hittite Galleys got in their first (+4 range could dominate surrounding land). RTS in the last few years have leaned towards symmetrical unimaginative map types (yes StarCraft I’m looking at you) for esports/‘fairness’ purposes or because of conscious game design (Wargame Series). The exploration in ROR made it beautiful, there was a joy in uncovering a virgin world and deep strategy in adapting to your position (yay Shorefish/Double berries, arrggghghhh no food, will have to dock start). Only Nomad on AOE2 really got this feeling and this is popular game type in AOE2 so I hope the randomness is retained. The way to ensure it doesn’t screw up tournament play is to play best of 3 games or perhaps have an option for symmetrical maps. Build Orders are pretty lame (you won’t find a ROR strategy guide with build orders, you can find loads for AOK), true strategy is exploring and adapting to what you have got.
The interaction with the Fauna. Unlike in AOK where wolves were little real threats (particularly when you have the loom) and had poor animation the fauna in AOE was amazing. Lions were deadly, particularly in pairs, Lions would chase Gazelles, the gazelles could be herded (difficult) and elephants could be drawn to your TC with better animations than they ever managed in AOK for the boars.
The Fog of War/Writing. I used to love every multiplayer game starting with players calling out their position on the map like the hands of the clock and the requirement to get writing from the Government Centre to see what your allies were doing. Again, it made exploration vital and produced some epic ‘unexpected save the day’ moments when you are getting pushed back by enemy chariot archers and then suddenly at the edge of the field of view enemy chariots start collapsing under fire from the fog as allies stream into help. AOK turned its back on this heavily with Cartography becoming cheaper and with the Portuguese and Rise of the Raja civilisations getting sight bonuses. It made a far less immersive game. The Timeline was useful to see if someone was going to tool age fast and building a military.
Asymmetrical and unique balance. Eventually the online communities settled on 3v3 Random Map, Random Civ, Speed 1.5 usually Continental or Hills as the default game type, so it didn’t really matter massively what civ you got as normally it would work itself out, so if you got stuck with crappy Carthage normally somebody else on the team would get someone good like Assyrian to counter weight. Even the poor civs (usually those lacking either archers and/or econ bonuses, Greek, Choson etc) could pull off a Tool Rush (Persian really had to)
Graphics - I think the team have done a great job with updating these.
What does everyone else want to see retained?
Craig
(TabooUmbeCSUK/Mystic_Taboo)
Totally agree with all you said.
i love you dude.
its exactlt the reason why every game in aoe was unique and refreshing and had charm
having random map with sometime bad starting position is what i can remember to be the more fun. even when the ennemy was coming to your base and couldnt find your villagers because they were in a forest 2km away… what began a disadvantage finally saved your ■■■.
moreover saying “we want fair map” its lile if you say in poker that everyone should have the same cards.what matter the most is that the odds of having good or bad map, is the same for every team.
and it tends to be fair generally.
its exactly the things that make the game unpredictive.
sometime u woll just find a lot of stone so you will decide to be tower heavy build order.
the one who wants total simetry, seriously, just go play sc2 or any existing boring rts game.
age of empire 1 is about turning the boards, making your best with what u have been given.
its like a battle royal and it ends up in the most chaotic and surprisings games most of the time.
who care about 1v1 pro gamer that represent 0.0001% of a community
age of empire 1 is more team vs team than 1v1 anyway.
because its easy to rebuild a base from 0
@Tgaud said:
having random map with sometime bad starting position is what i can remember to be the more fun. even when the ennemy was coming to your base and couldnt find your villagers because they were in a forest 2km away… what began a disadvantage finally saved your ****.
moreover saying “we want fair map” its lile if you say in poker that everyone should have the same cards.what matter the most is that the odds of having good or bad map, is the same for every team.
and it tends to be fair generally.
its exactly the things that make the game unpredictive.
sometime u woll just find a lot of stone so you will decide to be tower heavy build order.
the one who wants total simetry, seriously, just go play sc2 or any existing boring rts game.
age of empire 1 is about turning the boards, making your best with what u have been given.
its like a battle royal and it ends up in the most chaotic and surprisings games most of the time.
who care about 1v1 pro gamer that represent 0.0001% of a community
age of empire 1 is more team vs team than 1v1 anyway.
because its easy to rebuild a base from 0
what i like in afe of empire1 is precisely that its not a rts where you make precalculated strategies and equation on how to win the game.
each game is different. its about adaptation and instinct
Agree with your points. The random maps were one of my favorite things about the game as well. It made each game a unique experience and made early game exploration essential to properly develop a good strategy to handle the starting position you found yourself in.
IMO, Fog of War turned on is required for maximum enjoyment of each game.
The level of graphical detail in the game when it first came out combined with the sounds, the music and seeing units and fauna moving around on their own created a sense of awe. I still remember my very first game - there was so much to look at and explore and listen to - it was impressive.
Updating the graphics and animations in the DE so that a whole new generation can have that same sense of awe is a good goal. I look forward to having that first experience again in the new version.
having random map with sometime bad starting position is what i can remember to be the more fun.
Maybe you are a noob (its not an insult) but at a certain level its not possible. Fair map is not in debate or you want kill the game in the egg.
moreover saying “we want fair map” its lile if you say in poker that everyone should have the same cards.
In poker your opponent don’t know if your hand is good or not, in aoe you can’t bluff, bluff is the principal interest in pocker.
and it tends to be fair generally.
My experience on aoe3 said “no” (i don’t know on aoe1)
sometime u woll just find a lot of stone so you will decide to be tower heavy build order.
If your civ is rush civ, you are not happy to play defensivly because bad map. If your bo totally is conditioned by the map, it’s a probleme.
the one who wants total simetry, seriously, just go play sc2 or any existing boring rts game.
All other aoe tend to reduce bad generating map, specially at high level where you can rehost a game because of that (on tournament).
who care about 1v1 pro gamer that represent 0.0001% of a community
Lot of player are not pro but want progress and this part of player is a little more than 0.0001%, moreover, if your game is incompatible with high level, your game sux and can’t rise (especialy for rts).
age of empire 1 is more team vs team than 1v1 anyway.
It’s totally subjective opinion based on nothing.
An other point, at evidence you want play only with your friend a beer in your hand (i respect that but i don’t like beer), so your oppinion on balence, fair map or other thing like that is not usefull. Its not fun to lose because of map.