It can be a toggle option like others said, and let’s be honest : I think the argument of ‘‘it will be hard to recognize’’ could be true for some people but with the idea I shared you should recognize the unit by how it attack/move/stand and keep the original ‘‘idea/design’’. The screen it the perfect representation, im pretty sure almost everyone who play frequently the game know who is who on this screen.
And with all the new units they added (regional or unique unit and elite unique) it can already be hard to know what is what if you are not a very recurrent (or returning) player, so we could say the same but the idea of more unique/regional is just too cool to be avoided because of ‘‘I don’t know what this unit does’’. And like everything it just need some ‘‘time’’ for people to figure out. And it’s not that hard to do, especially since my proposal is to stay close to the original unit. I think it’s hard to miss if you know the game, even with sight/concentration problems.
And worse case scenario, the toggle is still there.
1. Categorize the various civilizations into several regions (similar to architectural style classifications) without needing to distinguish each civilization in detail.
2. Only make minor adjustments to the appearance of units to balance recognizability and cultural immersion, ensuring they don’t look like entirely new units.
3. The changes should be optional for players. Those who prefer not to make changes can enable the classic unit appearance option to continue using the current visuals.
About “readability”. Competitive PvP people should be satisfied with an on/off toggle.
For the rest I highly suggest trying out Star Wars: Galactic Battlegrounds with the Expanding Fronts mod. It has 16 distinct looking civs (some way more then others) and, after playing for a little bit, you’ll see that “reading” units isn’t that big of an issue. If at all.
Very cool ! It’s just as a picture or you plan to make it a mod, as a real ‘‘unit asset’’ ? I feel like modding units in AOE2:DE is way harder than in HD edition sadly…
These are just pictures as concepts, not real unit asset. I posted them in my private “Indic Modworks” discord with friends so if someone wants, he/she can use it as profile picture. Later I posted them here at official forum.
But if I want, I can make a real mod of units like those. In fact I did attempt to make not one but two attempts to make a unique Indian king earlier:
I moved to modding AoE3 nowadays rather than AoE2. Its been frustrating that every new game updates breaks the data mods and devs do nothing to help us.
Yeah it is a lot more time consuming now in DE than HD to make properly fitting graphics because of requirements of higher quality and higher frame count.
Yeah I don’t know why they don’t help with modding in AOE2:DE, I heard that every patch the mods breaks… it’s really sad ! Why this is happening ? Do we have informations ?
Yes exactly its already pretty hard but the good thing is number of new non-castle units is limited and they’re restricted to about 10 civs. With the rest of them I can comfortably recognize the unit. If you change it for generic units I can’t differentiate between knights or light cav. I have nothing against your solution being an interface option like the range mod which can be turned off but just don’t want it to be enforced.
No, the Huns are a type of Turkic-Mongolic civ, not an European one.
The Huns originated as a confederation of nomadic tribes from the steppes of Central Asia, probably related to the Turkic peoples and the Xiongnu, who migrated toward Eastern Europe.
They were not a single homogeneous people, but rather a confederation of diverse groups (Turkic, Iranian, Mongolic, and others) united under strong leaders.
They need to do a “Nomadic” architecture set for the Huns, Mongols, and Cumans. I’ve wanted a Barbarian architecture set for Goths and some new Barbarian invasion civs (Vandals, Saxons, and Alans or Sarmatians) but perhaps they could make that Nomadic set so that it fits for the Barbarian Invasion era civs as well.
110%. I know more noise is made about Persians getting Central Asian architecture, and I agree with that too, but IMO Bohemians getting Cent. Euro might be even more necessary; at the very least they’re equal need.
While I understand the players who reject regional (generic) skins, one thing is clear: even for ranked games, the negative impact would be manageable. Firstly, because everyone would have to deal with it, and secondly, because it’s just a matter of getting used to it. Eventually, both of these issues would even out, and things would return to normal.
Of course, I could completely live with it if it were optional, but it wouldn’t be a huge problem for anyone if it weren’t.
