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Posted: Sat Jan 16, 2016 9:04 am
by Murto the Ray
I think tutorials should be split into categories:
- Fundamentals (What you need to know to play the game, UI, lobby, basic gameplay)
- Improvement (Extra videos on concepts such as transitions, micro and macro, build orders etc.)
- Expert (even more advanced tutorials which would be useful to the player base at the moment, lowest priority to be made though)
Posted: Fri Feb 05, 2016 7:22 am
by noobmapmaker
Wondered how the tutorials are going, is there consensus on the topics that need coverage?
Posted: Fri Feb 05, 2016 8:39 am
by devilslayersbane
Some of you may be familiar with Red Alert: A Path Beyond. Currently, as part of a community effort there, myself and a few others have been working on a couple of documents to help explain the the game. We have also gone and added our own lore-friendly designations and descriptions to the units/vehicles in order to make the game a bit more immersive. If anyone here so desires, you may feel free to have a look at them, or use their general framework/lore. Keep in mind that these are still a work in progress, as there is some debate within the team on what is and isn't time-frame/lore friendly.
Links
Allied TRADOC
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1aAG ... sp=sharing
Soviet FM
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1w7o ... sp=sharing
Posted: Sat Feb 04, 2017 4:45 pm
by JOo
Posted: Sat Feb 04, 2017 7:11 pm
by zinc
SoScared wrote: ↑I think there's a need for even more basic and broader concepts here (for starters). Often a tutorial video series
is the way to get new players to try the game and if we are to take noobmapmaker's message of marketing to heart, the video series should reflect that.
A few thoughts:
The lobby - Multiplayer lobby and game lobby: Joining a server as a player and as admin. Encouraging play with strangers. Maps. The map resource site. Teaming up. The options. These are not trivial concepts. New players join the lobby all the time and slow everything down because they're not sure how to engage the lobby. This way they get hassled a lot by other players. There's a lot of video material here.
Battle control initialized - Starting position and basic economy: Locating your first ore patch and securing the first good ore refinery position. This is a big one and if newcomers can get this in order then they will be set to learn a lot faster and experiment with far greater number of concepts during a match. At first this sounds like a 1 minute long video, but going into details on
how and then demonstrate the benefits of a decent start, will help the newcomer tremendously.
I agree with your lobby suggestion.
I would also suggest advising people of the issues that can come from new players. Obviously we want new people to start playing but this can create game balance problems when new players, are, well, completely useless in team games. It can be frustrating for team mates and some people can be jerks over it.
So yeah I would warn new players over this issue. And don't take getting kicked from a server personally.
And of course you need to warn new players about artillery in this version and give some guidance on how to counter.
Also, don't spend all your money at the start of the game on troops and then just march them into the enemy pillbox.
Posted: Mon Feb 06, 2017 5:45 pm
by AMHOL
Posted: Mon Feb 13, 2017 3:50 pm
by Chimpo
I'll probably do a guide or at least a good portion of it, covering the basics and sound advice. The problem as I see it however though is that the vast majority of the information is in the game, mostly everything you need, there are very few hidden features or op strats. My point is that essentially a guide would be little more than advice to practice, practice, practice.
The core of the 'problem' at the moment is that the game has a large hardcore so noob stomping is very common, killing new players before they've had a chance to learn anything.
I heard some speculation on some kind of veterancy indicator, which would in my view help balance games and let noobs avoid getting stomped.
In any case, I'll do my best to make something that should help the noobs.
Posted: Tue Feb 14, 2017 1:06 pm
by eskimo
The videos about how to use the lobby and UI would be great. Having been playing for a few weeks now i can say that would of been superb for when i started. I only found out last night after someone pointed out i kept hosting games instead of using the server to host. At least i think that's what was happening? So this vid would of helped.
Playing wise, the post above about practice is the cold hard truth. Each map, player, and team offers too many scenarios to list. Whilst i can micro well from being an old C&C player, that doesn't help much at all. I frequently discover every game i loose is to a new tactic or play. Even after watching loads of replays i still haven't learnt to deal with the allies arty blob that just walks up a cell at a time for example.
I think because openra is so in depth due to every unit being viable it's far from a pick up and play game. If i wasn't into playing a single game at a time only i'd be playing CNCnet's versions.
Posted: Tue Feb 14, 2017 1:32 pm
by AoAGeneral1
The replay system can be used in many ways. Its important to note that when watching a replay is to watch how and what they do to react to your own actions.
You can also watch how and why they do the tricks they do. The only thing replays can't do is show the game from the players perspective which can be important in learning how to control the units.
Posted: Wed Feb 15, 2017 11:45 am
by OMnom
I think videos are a great way to teach newer players what to do and how to do stuff, but a document listing all of the unit stats, abilities, and nuances would be a very helpful resource for players to refer to. I tried out both mods when I first started playing this game, and a huge barrier for me was learning the basic details of the game. One could find all the stats and abilities from github, but it is a pain in the ass to go through github and to find/learn the units from lines of code.
Fortnight has done a good job in his RA overhaul detailing what everything does, but in my opinion, that type of information is easier for the player to learn out of game. It's clunky having to hover over everything to learn what it does, how much damage it does, etc. I also think that having a generic document/spreadsheet is the best way to explain what the differences are between RA and TD.
Posted: Wed Feb 15, 2017 3:03 pm
by eskimo
Oh man, a database of the different units and their pros/negs/armour etc would be great.
I literally cannot see the unit descriptions in game with my setup atm
Posted: Wed Feb 22, 2017 8:27 am
by Chimpo
eskimo wrote: ↑Oh man, a database of the different units and their pros/negs/armour etc would be great.
I literally cannot see the unit descriptions in game with my setup atm
There is a table with the stats of each units bouncing around, not a strategy guide but gives you some info. Let me see if I can find it...
here:
http://pastebin.com/raw/WDbQkkz6
A little out of date perhaps, but i'd guess mostly still true.
Posted: Sun Mar 05, 2017 5:58 pm
by JOo
Chimpo wrote: ↑
A little out of date perhaps, but i'd guess mostly still true.
i dont think so ... this is from "Mar 9th, 2016" and since then we had quite a few changes
not to mention the next release that is coming up with more changes
Posted: Sun Mar 05, 2017 8:57 pm
by klaas
There used to be a way to generate this with the OpenRA utility, using --generate-dps-table. Unfortunately I couldn't get it to work, so I guess it was changed/ removed at some point?
The pull request:
https://github.com/OpenRA/OpenRA/pull/6534
Posted: Mon Mar 06, 2017 8:52 pm
by abcdefg30
It was removed again in
OpenRA/OpenRA#9272.