New Game?

[Orm]

ORIGINAL: mercenarius

Here is the force setup for Arbogast's forces in the Battle of the Frigidus.

Note that only Eugenius and Arbogast are historical personages. The other generals are fictitious. But he must have had some additional leaders similar to them. The names are chosen randomly but the command ratings are set by the scenario.

Eugenius has a low command rating because he wasn't a soldier. The auxiliary forces are Franks (a little obvious, I hope, because of the Francisca) and Alemanni. That is the 'improved' icon on the Roman Generals' tiles.

I notice that Arbogast have the same counter symbol as a normal general. It is my understanding that Eugenius was merely a puppet to Arbogast. Will the program reflect this?

[Orm]

ORIGINAL: mercenarius

Thanks for hanging in there!

Thank you for continuing with this project. [&o]

The program looks more and more awesome with each update. And I am not talking about the graphic update. [:)]

Although the graphic is very nice.

[mercenarius]

This has bothered me for a while now. Theodosius is rated as a very good leader, but was he as good as Arbogast? I am not saying he wasn't. Just saying that with what little knowledge on the subject I have I would have rated Arbogast higher. Would be nice to hear your thinking.

I will certainly try to answer! On paper you could make a case for Arbogast deserving a higher ranking. But since Theodosius won this battle, if only because his prestige (as the 'legitimate' Emperor) was higher, I decided to give him an equal rating in this battle. In the campaign scenario it may be a little different.

It's a little hard to evaluate Theodosius because the period of his illness coincides with the one period where he wasn't as successful in the field? He never lost a battle, I believe. But, he had advantages, too, in those battles.

That's really about it, really.

[mercenarius]

Yes, Eugenius can delegate command to Arbogast, who is the commander in the battle. The icon is determined by rank and title. Eugenius does have the rank of Augustus, but he is a figurehead.

In campaign scenarios, Emperors (and Empresses) will be able to delegate much authority to favored generals. That includes situations in which generals usurp the throne and then are "delegated" to command. [;)]

[Orm]

Thank you for taking the time and share your thinking. [:)] [&o]

[Selus]

well...now the question is when we can play this game...

[Alikchi2]

Slow and steady wins the race. Honestly, it's kind of nice coming back to this thread every 6 months just to see the project is still alive. We appreciate the effort!

[Zorch]

Rome wasn't built in a day, y'know.

[Selus]

Any update?

[mercenarius]

Hello! Yes I can post a few screenshots and provide an update. I am finalizing the Notifications dialog and polishing the dialogs for initiating combat and making choices in the aftermath. I will also be revising the "automatic" combat resolution which 'Hannibal' doesn't have, but the new game really needs.

Here is a shot of the revised notifications. Unread notifications have their title in red. Not very original, I'll admit!

I have changed the purple color to off-white to avoid confusion with the colors of a particular Roman faction:

[mercenarius]

One notification can be expanded at a time. I am still working on the fonts and the typesetting.

This also shows how you can choose to select the event's location on the map. The "look closer" cursor will appear automatically when you hover the cursor over the location. Of course it takes a little experience to know that 'Venetia & Histria' is a location on the map.

[mercenarius]

When attacking a city or a fortress, you will now have three options, not two. This dialog shows the layout:

[mercenarius]

I apologize if the embedded graphics are as blurry on your end as they appear on my machine.

The three choices are:

1. Storm the city or fortress immediately.

2. Start a siege but prepare to make further attempts to advance the siege level. You make one such attempt at a cost of 4 movement points from the active leader.

3. Start a siege by gathering the maximum supplies to feed the army while starving out the garrison. This completes your leader's turn, just like in 'Hannibal'.

When a city or fortress is captured or starved out, you'll have 3 options: spare the city, plunder it, or burn it to the ground. The first is merciful, the second puts money in your treasury and makes your troops happy. The 3rd adds more money to your treasury and your soldiers' purses. But it establishes a reputation for cruelty that might be counter-productive. And it will hurt the province's tax base.

Of course captured enemy fortresses that you don't intend to garrison should be destroyed. Here is a screenshot of the dialog when a fortress surrenders after a siege:

[Selus]

wow nice sreenshot, now when we can prove the game?:p

[Orm]

Thank you for the update. Looking good. [&o] [:)]

[mercenarius]

ORIGINAL: Orm

Thank you for the update. Looking good. [&o] [:)]

Thanks, as usual, for your kind words!

wow nice screenshot, now when we can prove the game?

The truth is that the game is still at least a few months away. I am trying to arrange some modest funding so that I can work at it fulltime or nearly so. But I don't want to raise hope with false promises.

I will try to post a meaningful update next weekend with some new screenshots. Much of what I did the last two weeks was grunt work, such as improving the layout of the province borders in the Balkans and a revision of the mountain passes there. Not really that sexy, admittedly.

[lavanpk]

re: "modest funding" idea: How about making Hannibal available on Steam? I think the game would sell decently exposed to a whole new audience on Steam. Of course, I've no idea how Steam charges/pays out developers for hosting games...

[mercenarius]

ORIGINAL: lavanpk


re: "modest funding" idea: How about making Hannibal available on Steam? I think the game would sell decently exposed to a whole new audience on Steam. Of course, I've no idea how Steam charges/pays out developers for hosting games...

I am starting to explore this, yes.

Meanwhile, here is a screen shot of the new "move" cursors that are used when Point and Click is in operation. The first image shows how the cursor changes to indicate a move which is only an adjustment:

[mercenarius]

I probably won't use the translucent effect for the same adjustment when the player has Drag and Drop selected. But I will probably also use the new "Move Army" cursor when a player drags an army into a new province, so as to match what the Point and Click system will do.

Anyway, here is the cursor used to show the potential for an actual move:

[mercenarius]

I haven't forgotten about all of you!

I moved two weeks ago and I am still getting settled. But I have been working hard at finishing the icon inventory and coding the enabled/disabled states of all of the popup menus. And trying to get meaningful tooltips to explain when a menu item isn't available.

I will post some more artwork and screenshots of the popup menus in action by next weekend.

In the meantime, here is a shot of the naval move cursor in action. Not exciting, but it's something: