Going Medieval--Reviews of Medieval Scenarios

[Arthedain]

Re: Hammer of the North

Originally posted by Exile
The civs are; Danes, Norse, Germans, Franks, Frisians, Anglo-Saxons, and Scots/Irish. This choice is curious, and I wonder why the Frisians were selected over the more obvious choice of the Swedes.

Hammer of the North is mostly concentrated on the western parts of Europe, Swedish vikings went mostly eastwards to Gårdarike (Russia). Although much of the area is included, I think a Swedish civ would just unbalance the game (no civ in Russia) since going east and bribe giants and other good units is profitable. Besides, Sweden wasnt unified at that time anyways. IMHO it would ruin this particular scen.

[BillyBud]

Great reviews of the scenarios.

My only suggestion would be to provide links to the latest scenario game files.

[Exile]

JUSTINIAN THE GREAT

Although the time period of this scenario borders on the late classical, this era is widely seen as marking the beginning of the medieval. Created by designer and utility-maker Carl Fritz, Justinian encompasses a time of great turmoil and political fluidity effectively and colorfully.

Once again, the scenario is designed to be played primarily as one civ only, the Eastern Roman Empire. Faced with a multitude of historical polities, the principal combatants were narrowed down to; Goths, Vandals, Franks, Huns, and Sassanid Persians. The Roman Empire is divided into Eastern and Western halves, which might or might not act cooperatively. The map is medium sized, very well done, and effectively channels the movement of the civs into historically active areas.

The main difficulty of creating a scenario based on this period is the relative historical rapidity with which the German states appeared, acted, and then vanished. According to the chroniclers of the time, the Roman West was in complete political flux. Large groups of Germans moved through the empire almost at will. Carl dealt with this in an effective way, by using the best combination of events, unit abilities, diplomacy, and the map, to recreate the action and mobility of the era. This scenario is very tight, well-crafted, and directed. Most units ignore city walls, have 2 movement, and good firepower numbers. This makes for a game of conquest and empire building--given the neccessary momentum and reinforcments. Maintaining a conquered empire, however, is very tricky in this scenario. Cities are taken and retaken, and walls only succeed in keeping most places extant, providing little defense against vicious and aggressive adversaries.

There is clear direction in this one, and the historical dilemma of the Eastern Empire is closely simulated. As the Eastern Roman civ, the player watches the west rapidly occupied by Germans, is forced to fight on the western doorstep of Constantinople, and spends most of the game fighting a seemingly endless war with Persia in the east. Events generate the units which will, invariably, create/constitute the Vandal and Gothic states in the various regions where these historically appeared, while the Franks and Huns carve out states around/near their starting locations.

Happily, this scenario lends itself to playing the other civs, with the possible exception of the West Romans. Playing as the Goths, Vandals, Franks, or Huns can be great fun; building new empires on the ruins of the old one, waging savage battles with other emergent warlords, and trying to establish diplomatic links with distant, yet powerful Constantinople. Establishing, expanding, and maintaining one of these early German states can be very challenging.

Many times over, this scenario uses the propensities of the game engine effectively. The civ2 engine, in its normal, vanilla version, is there to do one thing--create a civ in a relatively normal, vanilla way. Significant changes in scale in a scenario, whether in map "scale," time/game turns, or units and populations, must be made with the AI in mind. Everything about this scenario is in harmony with this idea. The map is not so large that the AI becomes ineffective. The MGE diplomacy idiosyncrasies perfectly fit the era; the political situation is mostly chaos, and no peace lasts long. Game length is short, covering the period from 401 to 567, with 2-year turns. With only 83 turns, this is a military game with conquest as best defense.

Justinian has had the generous benefit of a Garethization of units, even though the original file was very nice. Both as an aesthetic/historical touch and as a further directing agent, are the leader and general units which are event-generated for the various civs. All the important personalities are represented, and the list is impressively inclusive. The antagonists of the empire include Alaric, Athaulf, Theodoric, Gaiseric, Clovis, Chosroes, Attila, and the Romans represented by commanders Belisarius and Narses. The leader units generally have a better attack/defense than normal units, but their real advantage is in their hit points/firepower numbers, giving them some striking/empire-building abilities, and keeping them in play for longer than a handful of turns. There are barbarians in the scenario, but they are restricted to the margins of the map, in north Africa and Transoxiana.

This scenario is a masterful example of the potential for medieval games. Everything runs very smoothly. It is action-packed and brief. Anyone who wants to create a medieval civ2 scenario should play and examine this scenario first. Above all, the most rewarding idea exemplified by Justinian is one of scale. I will elaborate more on this idea in the final, overall review.

[Exile]

MAMELUKES

Mamelukes is one of a series of medieval scenarios by Hereson. It is colorful, directed, and informative.

There are so many things I like about this one. Here is a list;

1.) The map. This is the medieval middle east as seen from the Arabic viewpoint. It is complete in ways that very few other maps have been. It includes regions that were vital components of the political and diplomatic situation of the time, but that have, to my knowledge, been incorporated in no other map of the region.

2.) The training of recruits to generate better troops. This is a unique and ingenius idea.

3.) Mamluk Egypt as last bastion of Islamic west asia against the incursion of the Mongols.

4.) Unit and city graphics. So well done, totally orginal designs. Great detail paid to historical accuracy.

5.) Overall attention to historical detail. The intimate history of the Mamluk state was a gap in my own knowledge. The readme file proved enlightening.

6.) The inclusion of the Sudan and Ethiopia.

Unhappily, this is one that seems to require some major revisions to be completely workable. The problems encountered were these;

1.) The mongol units event-generated at a very low number. 50 turns into the game, most of the central portion of the map is covered by them.

2.) Getting the recruits to Egypt. This is a very innovative idea, but its implementation here is problematic. The Crusaders/Franks and then the Byzantines both will attack the unarmed convoys from the Trade point, and if the trade point itself is overrun, no more recruits at all. You have no time to build the necessary fleets to convoy these units safely.

3.) On the higher settings, the Beduins of the desert west and south of Egypt prove almost unstoppable. Preserving the nascent Mamluk state from being quickly overrun is very difficult. Is this historically accurate?

There are so many things to enjoy in this scenario, but renewed testing could be very rewarding, and is necessary.

[Exile]

In Nomine Domini

IND is one of two scenarios created by Paul Mutica using Bernd Brosing's scenarios as a template, in this case, Cross and Crescent. Paul's designs are NOT simply modifications of Bernd's work, but are comprehensive reworkings down to very fine details.

Like Mamelukes, there are aspects to this scenario that are very nicely done. Here is a list;

1.) The units. Bernd's Brosing's medieval and ancient unit files are brilliant and colorful, and represent almost everything a medieval designer could want. Paul uses the best of everything, paying careful attention to historical accuracy.

2.) The Map. This is a very large map, but the size is put to good use. The individual regions are sized so that the local AI functions well. It covers the vital areas of historical action and effectively cuts off most of the inactive areas and channels movement by using invisible impassable units placed strategically.

3.) The Tech tree. This tech tree is far and away the best medieval tree I've ever seen. Very well informed and beautifully historical, it's a true masterpiece. I STRONGLY suggest that anyone creating medieval scenarios examine this tree first.

4.) The civs. The three civs intended for play are French, English, and German, with other civs representing the Fatamid and Turkish branches of Islam, the Byzantines, and a catch-all civ called Christian Kingdoms, which subsumes all the various independent regional states which existed at the time.

5.) The IDEA of a batch file that alters both the basic elements of the scenario and provides a new set of events.

There were aspects of IND that proved unsatisfying, however. Too many times the placement of impassable units limited strategic flexibility. The game is tightly bound to perform in the intended way, but perhaps too tightly bound. Strategic options are too few. As the English, holding on is just about all one can do--until the flood of units begins to appear in Normandy. As the French, there just aren't many options about where to direct military action--until the English units begin to appear in Normandy, and then hanging on is all one can do, once again. The Germans also have too few strategic options. The attempt to direct the players in this scenario is VERY well done, but tends to discourage spontaneous ahistorical strategies strongly. If you play this one, be prepared to reenact history, with all the frustrations attendant thereupon.

The use of the batch files has never been successful for me. The "event header not found" error always appears. Using it nevertheless, I attempted to examine the contents of the individual events files. There is some well thought out use in these, but the potential for this device was not fully implemented.

This is a complex scenario, deeply designed. Perhaps this reviewer is missing things. Do the more powerful units seen in the pedia make conquest, particularly city-taking, easier? It's difficult to say, because the new techs that provide these units prove difficult to obtain with all your cities producing military units while still losing ground. Emphasis on research and trade is only effective if these things can be protected. Are there events in later events files that eliminate some of the impassable units? Do unit stats for various types change with subsequent events files?

The most discouraging element of IND was encountered while playing as the French. During the initial run up to 1066 and the first batch file change, the French state can actually get on its feet and begin to build for expansion. It is under attack, but can make some progress. Just at the end of this period, however, the English recieve very powerful reinforcements in Normandy on every turn, sometimes more than one unit per turn. As the French player, watching your carefully-built state be occupied and ransacked by event-generated English units is no fun. While I do understand that this is intended to simulate the creation of the Angevin/Plantagenet state of the high medieval period, that state was created through fortunate dynastic marriage, not the conquest of half of France by vast, spontaneously-appearing English armies. This situation is rendered worse by the realization that, up to this time in Britain, the actual English are probably being overrun by Vikings of one variety or another.

In the end, everything works in this scenario. It is complete, and clearly functions in just the way the author intended. That said, the question of playability is raised, and that may be a subjective question. Is it fun? I strongly suggest examining it closely; if nothing else, it is instructive in the mechanics of the game and how they can be used effectively.

[Case]

More great reviews. Thanks Exile. Are you going to look at Harlan Thompson's classic Mongols and Vikings scenarios?

[Juggler]

true, Masis Panos had some great medieval scenarios with a mostly byzantine flavor. IIRC he was updating the turkish occupation of balkans scen. but he hasn't shown up here for quite a while

[curtsibling]

I think it is time for a new Medieval scenario!

Or a ToT update of Exile's Age oF Crusades!

[fairline]

These reviews are a great resource. Can they be either bookmarked in the SL site or listed in the great library topics?

[MacGalleo]

Thes reviews are very interesting.

[techumseh]

They should be uploaded to the SL review section. Phenix, is it possible to do a small screenie or two for each scenario?

[Jerec]

Where can I find Justinian the Great?

[McMonkey]

Justinian the Great by Carl Fritz

and also

Age of Justinian by Masis Panos

[curtsibling]

Nice one McMonkey!

Any chance of linking some others, old chap?

[McMonkey]

Even better, I have spent an enjoyable morning making some pages for the Scenario League. I have uploaded all the scenarios reviewed by Exile so far and added his reviews to each page (hope that is OK?):

The Age of Alexius

Death and Resurrection of an Empire

Justinian the Great

Mamluks

The Mongols: Timur Khan or Tamerlane

Shaibani: Quest for Khorassan

Reviews were also added to In Nomine and Hammer of the North. In case anyone missed these jems I recenly added:

Fading Lights

and

Komnenai

I will add graphics mods, ToT conversions and screenshots at later date.

I look forward to hearing Exile's review of Sieze the Crown and 100 Years War