The_Beast

i hope you can release something before august 31!

nice, buy the way, most of the time when you are bulding something, the sound of the credits dropping i almos never timed with the time remaning to build the item. we see and ear credits dropping but after 50% of the unit done then nothing and we just have to wait until it's done.

really nice keep up with the good work stephan, In the next version in skirmish mode, will you make emperor house avialable, and sandworm on/off feature? other stuff can you make turret able to force attack?( ex:to blow up spice bloom) Finally when will be able to sell or destroy our own structures? thanks!

hi, nice demo 4 some improvement since 3.5 and some life since more than one year! Bulding queue would be a good idea for factories. the game crash when harkonnen devastator explode. Fixing so when the game start no unit are out of screen. the screen bounds could be improve. satrting with an mcv instead of a delpoyed base would be nice keep up with the good job!

Java is excelent for gestion programming(in buisness uses). But it's really not appropriate for game. It's heavy on the system and memory, need plugins. C++ is really adapted to game programming and way more powerful. The manadgement of memory is the key to performance, try to improve you skill in this domain and you will be impress with the gain's you can obtain. Also in c++ you can break incapsulation rules more easely if the needs are there. All the knoledge you learned in java will be easly transferable to c++. I learned java and when i came to c++, i just realysed the power of it! ps can't wait to see some new beta of d2tm to test out :P I'm missing the crazy progress you made since last winter!

Stefan just sended me an email with the fallowing content : EA is accusing me of stealing their rights, and this morning the police was at my house. They informated me that I got to go in a detention center while waiting for my lawyer. I know since a long time that they don't appreciate what I'm doing but I never tought it would went to this! I hope things will end right, wish me luck.

What you think about that??

While looking at Battle for middle earth II game mods. I found some great new stuff the would be so cool to make with dune universe. Quote : http://www.gamespot.com/pc/strategy/battleformiddleearth2/review.html ***************************************************************************** The strategic mode in War of the Ring looks and feels very much like a board game, such as Risk. This isn't a complex or incredibly detailed strategy game, and EA keeps the overall management rather light. Your main job is to manage territories and move armies around the map. And since there are only two building nodes per territory (and only four building choices), you have to make some basic decisions about each territory's role. You might want your rear territories to house all the farms, which lets you recruit larger armies, while your front-line territories contain barracks to pump out units and fortresses to provide defense. Each territory confers certain bonuses to take into consideration as well, so that may go into your decision making. In addition, if you conquer whole regions, you'll gain even more bonuses. When two opposing armies meet, you can choose either to have the computer automatically generate the battle results or to play the battle yourself in real time. If you do play the battle yourself, you'll drop down to the province map and have to play it out just like you would a regular skirmish game, though any units or strategic buildings that were in the province at the beginning of the battle will show up on the battlefield. Needless to say, to win, just wipe out the opposing force. ***************************************************************************** This could be an interesting game mode( sure not making the same mistake ea done. The base should remain like you let them with the army as well ). While adding a whole research and investing( a bit like in ufo:aftermath) between mission the time continue and the enemy makes moves, to gain the new ubgrades you got to spend time and money doing research to acces each tech tree level. You build radar and drone technologies to see what going on dune. You see zones that are affected by sand storm and you can't access theses region during the storm (while the storm pass in a certain region some of the structures and units get damaged) Also between battles the player could trade spice and water and manage differents temporary allicances with The extra factions in extchange of ressoures( the Fremen( the people of dune ); the Sardaukar(house corino?); House Ix???; House Tleilaxu???; and the Spacing Guild;) [attachment deleted by Gobalopper]

Any news about the progress stefan ?

I not sure if at the moment bulding speed is increased by bulding numbers. Building queues sould be based on number of factories and paid before, money is liberate if canceled My suggestion One Yard/Factory(left menu base icons) normal bulding time for item(Rightmenu base/unit icons) No building queues Two Yard/Factory(left menu base icons) normal bulding time for item(Rightmenu base/unit icons) - 25 % 5 building queues Tree Yard/Factory(left menu base icons) normal bulding time for item(Rightmenu base/unit icons) - 50 % 10 building queues Starport queues maxed to 12 ( Computer AI should use starport to ) Are these freatures are planned? Sell function Power off function (on each building) Rally point (for each unit factory) Select the main factory(if more than one) ornithopter : they stay in the hight techfacility, you see a new icone (with the number of ornithopter disponible), when you click on it you can select a target(or maby a zone[like an artilery]) to attack then when the task is done they return to the hightech facility or patrole the selected territory. [Orny shoud use gaz to limit their flight time]. Custom cursor for deploy(mcv,[detonate devastator?]), return (harvester), selected (one or more) damaged unit over repair bay attack/move force attack/forcemove

I prefer this idea, but the spice sould reapear after certain delay. (ps: stefan i you read this, I would like to have your opignon about what i said in Reply #29 )

New balancing thing for demo 4. The worms at this time are not fearsome. If I let my unit on the sand (including harvester), during the mission the worm will eat mabe only 2 or 3 units, it dosen't give a bing impact. In my point of view, worm should be really more dangerous. First of all, in the dune movie, harvesting is a dangerous thing, the second that a worm is detected in the perimeter they call carryall to evacue. At the moment in d2tm, it's really rare that worms eat harvester. Troops deplacement sould bring significant danger, because a massive army moving on sand excite many worms. Rocks should be more significant as a secure place then just some place to put concrete and structures. If in d2tm harvesting was a dangerous thing, this could bring a lot more stategic. 1 Each times a worm sight is detected. The player first reaction would be : I got to save me harvester in priority. Then, are my units in security. 2 Attrackting worms to the enemy harvester with a kamikase ou a fast moving unit. At the moment I feel that the worm are in to mode : 1 moving for fun 2 seeking only one target, with no alternative. This sould be. 1 Seek the units that makes more vibration 2 If the worm can't reach unit or lost it, he seek for a next meal 3 Why not to size of worm? (on small and other 4x4 that can immerge form the sand in a strait shot, and make a hole in you 10 tanks moving to attack) If gathering ressources and troops movements is a more perious task, we would economy spice and try more tactics then just massive army ramming to the base. Wormsight should be more frequent and allways triggered be vibration. When the vibration level reach a certain value more than one worm show himself to eat. In a second part, would be cool to add every sounds that were in dune 2 and vocie message, i can't wait to ear again all the various sonds and the cool voice of the tree house and warning gived by the mantat. (ps: at the moment ther is still some sounds bug, some sounds or class of sounds are not playings for periode of time that appear again) [Volume options would be nice to, each time I start the game it change my windows wav and syntiser volume to the max] tell me what you think about that.

Do we gonna have blood when we squish or kill infantry(I remember some blood in dune 2, don't know were by the way :P ). Will infantry and trooper get shadow ? any estimated release date for demo 4? Continue your great job stefan!

at the moment : Ordos : 80% damage (faster speed) Harkonnen : 120% damage Atreides : 100 % damage The water could mix thing up Ordos : 100% damage (faster speed) Harkonnen : 120% damage Atreides : 100 % damage ( stillsuits ubgrade & consume water more efficently ) [stillsuits ubgrade only avalable to atreides ( as int he movie, the water is much more in the atreides culture ), fremen should only be atreides freinds] the idea of water silos is really interesting. I think the water element could bring much more strategic posiblity Spice : The main economy, used to buy stuff Water : Needed to maintain the troops, the critical level of water should be proportional to army/base size Electricity : Needed for building and maintain base. ( when no power on : turret/radar offline, building speed is decrease by 50~75%, no worm sight/enemy attacking alert ) the water/spice could be traded in the starport, stuff like that. The windtrap, capture water at slow rate and also generate power. you can also build 3 new types of structure : 1 - water silos : the structure is mostly underground ( to isolate from the burning sun ), there are some elements (to enter in it, pumps, etc) at the surface 2 - Advanced water gatherer : ( maby somthing that filter sand and rocks to extract some umidity) ?? 3 - Sun pannel : the name explain itself. we could find many other stuff to seperate the 3 houses harkonnen cruelty and the drinking blood ritual, with not find somthing with that(mabe some kind of fenzy when that kill/destroy somthing that make them more crazy[they fire more faster but with less accuracy]). and for the ordos we sould find mabe, some genetical modification or invent new stuff that suits to the dune univers.

at the moment it takes 10 rocket tower cannon bullet to kill a atredies trike, thi isn't really normal. I was stuck a mission 9 playing ordos with no more harvester ( prehaps because i add build some carryall )? why a troopers squad is more powerfull than a combat tank? i think eaven a single tropper can kill a tank. i just observed somthing, all dune 2 units don't make a lot of damage, so when you increased the damage of troopers. I just discovred that all the dune 2 unit do weak damage, so if you want to bounce up infantry ( this is a good idea ) all the other units sould be tweaked (firepower, rate, speed, hp) to balance the whole stuff. Why don't balance the dune 2 units to make them more realistic and give to each of them weakness and strength. in my opignon the new balancement to deviators make them to week, don't forget that ordos can only buy missile tank with starport. This is a lot to discuss here, but mostly some test have to be set to obtain more equivalence in the units strength.

When do you intend to create your team of programers/artist/game designer/etc for you the second part or your dune 2 project. I would really like to participate into the second part of the project. I think I could be one of the game designer ( I like a lot the ideas that were allready brought in forums. Also I got a tons of cool ideas. Some stuff in other rts games would be crazy to see in the same game ) with my experience in gaming ( My first pc was a commodre 64, i'm playing a lot of genre of game so i've seen a lot of stuff, that we could mix/implement into a rts game). I also have skills in c++ programming so i can help with coding. I got an formation in computer technology so i can help in many ways. The progress of dune 2 the maker is getting near completion so fast, immagine the possibilies with a team. Let me know what you think about that. ps. (I'm also interested to be a tester like you mentionned in an other post and i can't help you dealing with the forum to update stuff like to do list, change list, anoncement of comming stuff and the ideas you want to implant stuff like that)

I want to know when ( demo 4 or v1 ) you gonna focus on implanting a good control system with the ideas that people are asking in this post. ctrl Force move/ alt force attack, x makes units scatters, the quick radar fonction and other common rts controls? also 2 things that would be cool are 1 double Left click on one unit, select all units of the same type your can see in the screen. a quick key, that select all unit in the screen and if you double hit that key select all the units in the map.

this is a good idea, but one thing important is NEVER, NEVER add a unit limit like in starcraft/warcraft cause this ruins a good rts, all the westwood rts (c&C,Red-Alert) were the only to let you build massive army. I think is much more fun to be able have the amount of unit we want.

D2TM is getting nicer and nicer trought the release, good job Stefan 1 : In my opignon the new balencement for Quads/Trikes and Trooper/Infantry need some fixing. A single Trooper's squad can take more than 2 quads in a faceoff. The missile damage is way to hight(from 8 to 16 this is crazy, you should set it a maximum 12). Why Infantry have more hp than trooper, they have weaker armor. Quads and Trikes are supposed to be infantry killer, now with their damage reduced to infantry they are useless. The rate of fire is a bit to fast. At the moment 3 trooper's squad is best than 3 tank to destroy a base. All the bonus to Trooper's make's atreides infantry more useless than ever. Try out mission 4(the mission when you gain the tank) playing atreides and you recive a drop of 2 harkonnen trooper's squad you are almost doomed unless you have build massive infantry squads. Cause they blow up trikes and quads in 1 second. 2 : To balance the stuff here my suggestion - Trooper HP INCREASED 45 to (70) - Troopers HP INCREASED from 110 to 140 - Troopers sight/range INCREASED from 4 to 5 - Troopers damage to vehicles INCREASED from 8 to (12) - Troopers Attackfrequency LOWERED from 25 to (20) - Soldier HP INCREASED from 20 to (60) - Infantry HP INCREASED from 50 to (120) - Quad damage to infantry(*) LOWERED from 12 to (10) - Quad attack frequency should remain as in dune 2 - Trike damage to infantry INCREASED from 7 to 8 Also in addition there should be a new weapon for infantry, they use bullets for infantry and grenades for thank/structures. To make atreides infantry significan in an army (mabe add a gateling gun for trooper's squad only as a second weapon would make them more polyvalent) the rest is really great, continue your great job!

I have spoted some other stuff for sugestions 17 : Tank Turret destroy wall when attacking enemy's. Bullet should pass over in my opignon. 18 : Stand and atack mode for tank to make temporary turret. 19 : Startpor order maxed to 12, and the computer AI should use starport to. ( this could be interesting, to recive a wave of 8 tanks in one shot from the computer ) 20 : One great eye-candy addition could be increasing the unit posture/position from 8 to 16, this would make the turning of the unit more fluid. 21 : At the moment, I don't understad the interest of the palace icone in the left bulding row ( maby you have future plan with this ) 22 : Some addition that could be interesting is superweapon for each team accessible by the palace ( harkonend death hand missile, atreides fremen, ordos saboteur ) stuff like that. 23 : Palace could would add some new functions : A- Ubgrade Power Generators. B- Ubgrade spice storage. C- Give the ability to radar to make scans ( this would not reveal the fog but in your radar you will see the enemy possession for short time in the selected zone ). D- (Somthing like paratroops timer) 3 Carry all arrive and drop 3 infantry squads in the selected emplacement. There is an important bug that makes the game crash i don't know why but I know with what. the game crashed 2 times when this particular situation arrive : [ A rocket tower fire at an devastator tank, the devastator is moving to reach the tower location when he recive the last rocket to make him devastate the game crash and close imediatly. ( i think it's because the devastator is between 2 square of map and when the tank try to calculate the 8 sqare around him he found's half-square so he bug) ]

but what you think of the sand worm stuff i'm talkin about ? also some times certains sounds stop and come back an other time. a volume controle in the menu for music, voice and sound effect would be nice cause the music is not enought at high volume compare to the unit fire sound.

I just finished the harkonnen senario, we can really feel we are playing dune 2, it's really great. I had some new idea/comments. 12 : Woulde be nice to start bulding stuff when we don't have the exact cash, and the counter just stop and wait for more money. (don't know if it's had or not to make in c++) 13 : Add more steps to the wating circle to make the it more fluid. Also synchronise the cash dropping with the completion advencing. At the moment sometimes the bulding is at 70% completed and the money stop dropping. 14 : The sand worm blur is not enought visible. the best would be ( to give a good impression of is monsterous size ) to make a the visual effect like in the picture attached. The grafical texture shold be moving sand ta leaves a puff, a bit like the harvester sand drop, and after his passage should leave a little trace ( the sand show be at a lower level like in the other joined picture ). 15 : I can't see the sonic tank bzz is that normal? 16: The range of the rocket tower is strange some times it can out range the rocket truck. and i found it a bit to great. I don't see guard tower and they are allready attacking me. When a tower or a unit fire on one of our unit, this should open a little visible spot ( it was in the original dune 2 i think ) continue your great job, you are amazing. (ps: a post like a "to do" list to have an idea of what you want for the first part of your project(dune 2 clone) and see checked items that are completed and a pourcentage of completion between releases would be nice) [attachment deleted by Gobalopper]

Tx a lot for taking in consideration my ideas to precise the point 6 If we could build walls like in age of empires. But after the wall setup is positionned and started the con yard is buzy until all the walls in the row are build. and also, the orientation of the building for the wall like in command and conquer generals would be great because(see the screenshot, sure it's purly estetical but would be more eye candy) , and modify the grafics of the wall when it ends near a turret would be eaven beter. something I forgot is timed auto destruct for the devastator, press deploy key to make it explode after 5 or 10 seconds [attachment deleted by Gobalopper]

Hi, wow the progress since beta 0.92 is amazing. I'm checking the updates since november and I can't wait for the next release. Good work, continue! I remaked some stuff in the demo 3 that should be fixed or few of my suggestions to ameliorate this allready incredible project. 1 : We can't order the units to attack walls. 2 : Will we be able to sell structures (and gain infantry and 50 % money) in the future version. 3 : Would be nice to be able to place the ubgraded concrete(2x2) with only at least 1 valide square to place. Sacrify money to build only 3,2 or 1 concrete block. ( i think it was in the original dune 2 ). 4 : Add the original hot key to dune 2 [ctrl:force attack, alt : force move, R: retrete in dirrection of the constrution yard, ... ]hotkey. 5 : Have the hability to run over soldier with heavy thanks, but with a damage penality ( cause by running on explosives ) proportional to the weapon damage of the enemy (exemple : higt to low : 1 Sardaukar's, 2 troopers, 3 infantry ). 6 : When you place wall if you old the click button, you can select the direction of the wall and you can make a single row by moving the cursor, and then your yard is blocked until your row is finish to build. Also adapted grafics to wall to make then fit to turrets would be so cool ( like in dune 2000 when walls end near turret ). 7 : The troopers, sardaukar's can be anti-air and the missile lanchers can be anti-air but with only 25% of the land accuracy. 8 : [Explosions, missile, or a certain amount of heavy bullet] on clear concret, sand and rocks damage de terrain. 9 : Implements a repair/return curosr whend on the repair depo or rafinery. 10 : Adding the unit stack build like in the starport. 11 : I think there is a visual bug in the lower part of the construction yard grafics. Give me a feedback of what you think (ps, sorry if my english is bad)