Taxing times

Time to think about how often farms and mines produce resources. Once an hour seems a bit of a long time to wait, but I suppose it could also encourage players to raid unwary neighbours. It also seems logical because one game day takes one hour in real time.

The pipes, the pipes are calling...

All the same, I wonder how gates will work?

Jack Frost's machine gun

I can't believe the damage frost can cause to plumbing. It really does look like the pipes have been strafed with machine gun fire! I hope the new plastic pipes will be better.

Water, water everywhere

Fixing burst pipes is not much fun. So far I've found 8 splits in just 20ft of piping and there's 40ft more to do tomorrow...

Terraforming troubles

I think I need to put some more thought into the way the landscape can be changed...

Winter Wonderland

Oo, it's all snowy! And here's a unit of archers singing a (fortunately inaudible) version of 'Good King Wenceslas'. Have a good crimbo!

Genuine Havock

Nothing possible today: burst pipes! Water everywhere! Still bailing and waiting for plumber!

Edit: Got the pipe capped in the end - had to do it myself. On the plus side I'm now quite good at white-water rafting!

Wreaking Havock

Today I got into destructive mood and torched a few houses...

A little place in the country

I'm still working on the building system. I now have a nice carousel menu for buildings so I can have as many menu items as I like. The hard part is making a system which is both flexible and intuitive. I'm trying to get that immersive feeling which you can get from building model railways and the like.

Maybe going solo carol-singing wasn't such a good idea...

I think the building system is going to work like this: you can build or destroy anything within range of your king (that's him on the horse). Other units have limited demolition capabilities. For example all units can destroy wooden structures with fire, but only kings, catapults or cannon can destroy stone structures. Though the king is very powerful in this respect, he's also very vulnerable to attack, and if your king dies - that's it, game over. All your units are removed from the game and you have to start from scratch! This means that you can wipe out an entire army if you can get to their king and kill him. It also means you have to keep your own king very well defended. Because the game runs in real time you'll have to make sure he has a good bodyguard around him before you log off!

Building bridges

Being able to raise or lower the landscape as you build means that building bridges (or moats) is possible.

Camelot!

(Actually, it's only a model) Walls today. I might have to rethink the 'only allowed build by roads' thing, or making walls like this would be rather awkward.

Planning permission

Buildings can only be built beside roads and have to be within range of existing buildings.
I think I'm going to need more than one building menu, the one I've got is nearly full already!

A* is born

It's not perfect yet, but the new pathing system is a lot better than the old one.

Too many distractions

Can't seem to find 10 mins without being called away for something or other! Tsk! I must get the server-side and client-side pathing synchronised.

AI first steps

This is the simplest sort of AI. It wouldn't find it's way through a maze but then, armies seldom have to! I'll need to tweak the client-side obstacle avoidance a bit to stop the soldiers marching through the end of the fence though.

Exigencies

No time today so here's an old shot of moonlight midst the mills;

Ooo! Vids!

Thanks to CamStudio I can now make gameplay videos.

 

Here's one showing how to lose a skirmish really badly...
Later on I'll try and make one where I win!

When life gives you palises, make palisades.

A second go at palisades;

Of course, fences like this mean that path finding is much harder for the AI!

Too late!

 

Bravid's had it! The enemy's here in force. I'd best run and look to my own defences.

A Friend in need

Well, I suppose I could send a troop of foot soldiers...
Lots of refactoring today so no new eye candy, unless you count the chimneys on the farms...

Bijou empirette

First go at roads today. You can only build buildings beside roads so they're an important part of territorial expansion. Roads also increase the speed of troop movements so they have a strategic element as well. The current road-laying system is a bit clunky but it'll do for now.
I've also added longitude and latitude on the HUD, so players can tell where they are.

Land of Plenty

Here's an army in the making;

I only really had time today to add smoke to the (not yet built) chimneys. Doesn't look too bad!

Blooming kids!

When a mummy farmer and a daddy farmer love each other very, very much, they hold hands and soon the stork brings them a little baby. The little baby grows up into a rude and sullen teenager who eats all their food and never does any work, so the mummy farmer and the daddy farmer are really quite glad when a passing warlord conscripts the teenager into his army and sends him off to be slaughtered in the cause of making the warlord richer and more powerful. To tell the warlord that there's a new recruit, the farmers put a glowing, rotating man above their house, like this;

The right-hand image has a bloom effect applied. While this does make the image nice and glowy it also reduces the fps by 3/4, so I guess it won't be going in the game. It was worth a try though!

I'd hammer in the morning...

More work on the building menu today. I'm still pondering the best way to implement walls and palisades. I suspect that I may have to limit them to north/south or east/west orientations.