First thing I'd suggest is the unofficial patch, it adds lots of good stuff, upping the unit cap, adding some new controls and an interactive megamap. Nothing seems out of place, just seems like stuff that Cavedog would add if they were around and supporting the game.
For bonus points it can be uninstalled from the Start Menu without need to reinstall TA.
http://www.tauniverse.com/forum/showthread.php?t=43735

Second thing I'd suggest - though not for people playing for the first time as this is a mod more than a patch - would be Total Mayhem, again this mod is focusing on trying to be the same quality as the original TA assets and being in line with what Cavedog did and would have liked. So you start the game with tier one units Peewees and A.K.s, then you get to tier two units like the Can and Zeus as per usual (with some balance alterations, which is for the best in regards to the mod IMO, but changes play a little bit and is all the more reason to play without the mod first) - the change? It adds a Spider Factory which is cool, Spider Bot style tanks of varying styles, it adds a third tier of units - we're talking tanks the size of Advanced Construction Buildings and mechwarrior style walkers will dissolve a base, and even more buildings, new defenses, new economic buildings - essentially Total Mayhem adds another phase to the game and then ultimate units atop that.
It seems well balanced, it looks the part and it is fully compatible with the unofficial patch.
Possibly the best part -it installs into a subfolder in your TA directory so you can still play vanilla and uninstalling is easy with it's own Start Menu folder and uninstall program which restores your TA completely to normal.
http://www.moddb.com/mods/total-mayhem
It's huge and it feels right.

I believe it was a Total Mayhem discussion that turned my attention to this map archive:
http://files.tauniverse.com/browser/?repository_id=fileuniverse-library&folder=%2Fta%2Fmaps-1#1
You can scroll down the ta\Maps-1 to 'zeal-maps' those are all quite nice and most feature multiple maps hence the download sizes, just put the files in your TA folder or your TA\Total Mayhem folder whichever application you are running which you want to play the maps in. I've played a few and they're just good maps, nothing much more to say.

Someone else posted this:
http://www.ratpacker.com/
I've not yet looked much into it, but it is another collection of maps with images of the minimaps to show you the basic layout and the uploader has given the maps scores to serve as a guide of sorts to good/bad maps. They're even divided by size.

I also wanted to try Escalation, but that broke the Megamap functionality of the unofficial patch for me (it shouldn't, it is designed to work with the patch) and ... once you go Megamap you won't go back.
http://taesc.tauniverse.com/?p=downloads
Try yourself if you want, but try Total Mayhem first :)

(I forgot how good this game was, so many wasted hours - wasted not playing!).

You gave TA Zero a try too? You can check out gameplay videos here:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIGJ_Jt1C7W0MU5RHn2h10w

I had not, I have now 'cause I didn't want to say 'No' :P My impressions of it after three matches versus AI are the same as they were before I downloaded it to be honest.

It looks amazing, straight up visually fantastic and it has such nice little touches and a lot of cool details like different types of commanders, it has even added a third race, it completely overhauls the economy - though personally I think this is not a good thing, it is really restrictive on the income, ARM solar panels give tiny amounts of energy here - but then it doesn't really go anywhere.

Three races instead of two, all the original units and buildings have been scrapped, that's a huge change, take a while to get used to, but okay ... except that it isn't finished and one of the lead people working on it seems to be MIA. Also reading their forums a lot of the maps are unbalanced for the player numbers they talk about with some players getting half as many resources as others so those are kind of insane (someone on the forums said that you should be playing with allies and could trade resources, but as far as I am concerned that answer is nonsensical, if you say a map is for four players make the players equal, if half the players are disadvantaged it is a two player map and make a note that there is the option to play allied four player).
The map issue doesn't bother me that much though as I found one of their .... I found YOU (Just noticed the name) had done some great maps which seem balanced and fun.
But you get four aircraft and no tier two.
if this was your first experience of TA I'd get it.
If this is something you come to when you feel tired of other mods and vanilla, I get it.
There is clearly a lot of great stuff going into this mod, but you can also see really quickly that units are missing and that the big economy shift is going to change things for you and the entire new roster of units and a third race are something that is going to take your investment for quite a while to get fully into - I don't see how that is a worthy prospect when from the official website we're two years since the last update and a lead modder is doing other things.
A real shame 'cause along with the negatives I feel toward TA Zero is the same excitement I felt when i first saw it online. Where Total Mayhem has made their aim to expand TA in Cavedog's own direction to a point beyond what was previously reached Zero has decided to take the engine and basics then drag it on a severe deviation - It adds shields and melee combat for heaven's sake, that's amazing! Between the two you have the best of both worlds it would seem, the mod for people that like what they had and wanted more, the original with the unofficial patch for those who just don't want to mess with perfection and this for the people who're having a blast, but want to switch things up a bit and inject a severe dose of 'Ohmygod that's cool!'. <- Particularly because you can have all three instances installed at once!

I'm certainly not planning to uninstall it right away, but I can't see myself recommending it before it sees more content and I'm worried it never will. It works and is good, but there is more content to vanilla, Mayhem adds a pile on top of that and Zero has a bit left undone.
If you don't like Mayhem and want a mod, definitely take Zero out for a quick try and see if you enjoy it, but for someone's first mod to TA I'd want to show something expanded not something smaller though with many nuances.
Who I would definitely recommend it to is modders, Mayhem is fine as it is, Zero completed would be astonishing. Not for everyone certainly, but this is far from amateurish, it is gorgeous and inventive and could really make the perfect trilogy with the vanilla patched and Mayhem alongside.

http://www.tauniverse.com/forum/showthread.php?t=44715
That thread has the downloads for TA Zero alongside TaShaden's maps which I definitely recommend.

Well thanks that was the reason i created my maps because i disliked the standard maps in team games.
It is not true though that noone is working on the mod anymore. Progress is slow but Voh is updating the mod very frequently (7 Updates in the last 2 weeks). Those updates are experimental though and not available on the homepage. The new patches add a bunch of new t1 and t2 units and t2 air (only 1 gunship per side yet though). You can get the experimental patch on the forum.
http://www.tauniverse.com/forum/showthread.php?t=44715

Well that is certainly very cool, not as dead as it appeared, sneaky mod, very sneaky.
Still incomplete for the moment, but definitely showing signs of improving on itself, definitely worth keeping an eye on then and I feel the small additions make a good improvement to the feel of the mod.

I'm still amazed by what the community has managed really (VOID SHIELDS! ARGH!), last time I looked at TA mods it was all either just ugly or unbalanced unit packs, now we're getting full blown greats.

Since you've been aware of the mod longer than I and active on their forums I wondered if you could tell me, TaShadan: Why no metal makers? The economy is pretty deliberately harsh I understand, but I still wonder if they ought not be there. I have to assume this has been asked a lot and it'd be an early thing to add, so I'm guessing that they've said categorically they don't want them.

Also, as a map maker I figured you would be the one to ask - are maps generally perfectly okay for any version of TA, Vanilla/Mayhem/Zero? I can't see why they wouldn't be really, but you'd know better than I.
I guess unit size vs navigable gaps is at least one possibly limiting factor, but I doubt a map with such tight confines that it'd be a big problem would be all that fun anyway.

I was not around when they decided to skip them. As far as i know they had them in the early releases. If you want to know more you have to post on the tauniverse forum.
Most Zero maps are not suitable for other mods/ota and vice versa because of how resources are placed. ALso Zero maps use a lot of custom/unique map features which are not available in the other mods/ota.

Enhanced has a great concept too, I particularly like the effort of changing the appearance of the original units (of real TA) especially when their stats are changed. As bonus he also changed the buildpics. Originality! Great.

PS: TAK has many many mods too (maybe even more than TA), but that's not the thread. :P

I have my mod and will toss it up soon too, once I deal with the gog version being so slow...

I am eagerly waiting (no seriously, I am).

So there are enough changes adn notes to this overhaul that until I find or rewrite that doc I'd rather send to you in a pm?

That would be fine, Thanks!

is there a place you know to play against others online in TA? Love this game and looking for some competition

I have downloaded TA commander pack as i loved it when i had the disks back in the day. I no longer own the disks, I can not get the patches to work as it still says it is version 3.1. As such i can not run any mods which i loved back in the day (like mayhem). I basically downloaded my gog version, installed it and then from there downloaded the two patches which i installed but nothing seems to have happened?

Gameranger

Hi All , Im new to this but an old player of TA , Im looking for someone and or somwhere to play online .
Is there anybody out there?.