Lobbies, parties, clans and handicaps

Finding a game#

Use Play with Friends for private LAN discovery or direct connection. Players join before the match starts. Public co-op browsing and its filters remain planned until the Steam provider is connected and tested.

Staying together#

Local matches offer a rematch. A persistent Steam party that keeps everyone together between matches still needs live integration and testing.

Clans#

Clans have a name, a tag, a banner, members and a few roles. Clan leaders can invite and remove members, and clan tags are moderated. A clan never gives a gameplay advantage and cannot reserve a player color. Playing offline never needs the clan service.

Handicaps#

Each seat can have a handicap that adjusts its economy within a limited range. Everyone in the lobby sees it, and it is recorded in the replay and results. Bots use the same labelled handicaps.

The development build has the handicap rules: a seat's villagers gather at 70 % to 150 % of the normal rate, every player sees each seat's handicap, and the match history records it. Choose Gathering rate for each seat in match setup.

When a teammate drops#

In team games and co-op, a teammate who loses connection can reconnect and take their seat back. Meanwhile a caretaker bot, or a willing teammate, can play that seat.

In the development build's shared matches, the network panel offers to play a dropped teammate's seat until its player returns, and its player can take it back. The held-seat view lets the temporary controller select and order that seat's units. This path still needs live two-machine release validation.