I'm sure you guys realize that it will be a good amount of time before true Beta Testing will be going on as i'm building the game from the ground up. My current goal is to get a functioning playtest where you can do all the basic activites that will be involved in managing your airland, populations, resources, raising armies. After that the next step will be developing combat.
Yeah, I can beta test too, maybe. Real time or Turn based?
My best answer to this would be both, battles will be played out in real time, units will have their own personal turn system, allowing some units to take their turns more quickly, while others have to take turns more slowly. Since combat will be relatively hands off, it should appear to be more real time. A good battle plan and thinking ahead should be the most powerful thing on the battlefield. Fighting while logged on will allow for adapting your tactics to the conditions of a battlefield, while keeping the ability to gain land from offline players limited enough to make attacking other online players the better course.
You know what would be cool?
If the Beta testing ends up being the 'lore' behind the game (rather than some pre-determined boring fluff that nobody really cares about)? All those changes could be rationalized as being caused the magical instablity of the islands and the massive spells that these "Early Warlords" cast with much abandon.
I have to say this would be pretty awesome.
This sounds interesting.
What are your intentions on scale for a single tile? Would one hex be enough to hold an entire city of tens of thousands? Or would it spill into the nearby squares using that hex-division system you made? I think that'd be neat.
Also, I like SC's suggestion and offer to write about it.
In my mind each hex tile is the equivalent of ~160 acres which is a square 1/2 mile, or the equivalent of 1/4th of a square mile.(each sub hex would then be ~40 acres) It would be large enough to hold a village of several hundred, but getting into the thousands it would, as you described, have to sprawl into adjoining subtiles and tiles.
Sign me up for a beta test as well, sounds awesome.
You might want to use a different texture style though, maybe something.....sleeker.
I don't know, its your choice anyway.
I do agree, and am planning on slowly generating better art on the side as I get more of the code up and running.
Currently I'm working on getting some simple 3D models built and loading properly, and should have something to show later on tonight.