RomaMini - Development

[Cyrion]

Re: RomaMini - Development

Originally posted by Harry Tuttle
This is a quick and dirty scenario I'm working on. I'm taking a little break from AE2 at the moment, as I'm all world-warred-out at the moment.

The scenario is based on a very small map, 40x60

A quick scenario on a small map, based on roman times???

Me like!!

[fairline]

Had a look at the map Harry - Are those the cities you are going to use in the final version? If so I would replace Thessalonica with Pella, include Mediolanum for the Romans, Sarmzagetusa for the Dacians, Numantia for the Iberians and Alesia or Lugdunum for the Gauls. Rename Persia to Parthia for this time period and include Ctesiphon as it's capital. Cyrene should be up a tile on the NW coast of Cyrenaica.

[fairline]

Originally posted by Arthedain
Actually I'm too lazy to modify the map you have now (just woke up). But I did resize two gigamaps, to only cover the area your map did (well almost, maybe you should cut it some more, and I'm not sure how much of the Atlantic etc. you want). The first one is used by Curt in his scenarios (made by Mercator IIRC) and the second one (dunno who made it) is used in a bunch of scens really.

Map no. 2 is good

It does Italy and Sicily better than Harry's, and I think the fact that it is slightly larger would make for a better game. You could probably lop off a bit of Scandinavia and the Hebrides/Orkney etc, and maybe lose some of the East beyond the Persia (no need for India or the Eastern Steppe in a Rome scenario IMO).

[curtsibling]

I just remembered that in ToT, it is harder to remove/hide the unit health bar.

But in this case, the ToT strength bar may be useful to
represent the garrison or barbarion condition...But for
any terrain units or such, the bar will have to be hidden
using Merc's sprite utility...

[Harry Tuttle]

@Cyrion: Thank you!

@Arthedain: I'll have to take a look at the map tonight as I am no where near Civ at the moment so I'll let you know what I think.

@Curt: I will keep that in mind. I'd like a nice clean look to the units and the health bar would not be needed for some of the non-combat/low health units.

@Fairline: The time period I was thinking of would be roughly 220 BC to 250 AD. So really, I'm thinking of having it begin at the outset of the Second Punic War and end at the typical Fall of the Empire. Actually, what am I talking about - It's the span of Roman dominance. I'm not too hellbent on depicting events exactly as they occured, just basic power structure. This is somewhat open ended after all.

I don't know about including the early encountered Gallic tribes like the Allemanni, Quadi, and Marcomanni. While they did play a large part in early Roman history I don't know if making them seperate from the typical Gallic Celt will lend a lot to the scenario. Due to the small size of Western Europe and the later tribes that probably should be mentioned it might become too much to include.

The Germans can always just be one tribe, but I want to include the later barbarians as separate units. I'm a little bit on the fence about the Britons as Caesar identified them as having painted themselves blue most of the time, but you're right, they were Celts, and Celts liked "The Woad". So yeah, maybe they should be seperate. I'm only worried about event language and having unit pop up points seperate according to area.

I like the Sarmatians, Alans, Parthians, and Iberians as additonal tribes. They will be perfect. The Sassanians are a bit far along, so I think they might have to be left off for now.

You're correct about the settler and warrior combination. Though, I was planning of using some of the buildings from Curt's cities to depict settlements. Plus, the settlements won't have the settler flag, so no eventual cities.

I love your idea about the later Romans and the change from standard infantry to mounted cavalry. I haven't given too much thought as to techs or obsolescance of wonders, but I'm open to ideas. I think Leo's workshop will be perfect.

I want to include the Seleucid Empire in the scenario. I wasn't until Pompeii took Syria in 64 BC that the Empire finally fell. The Parthians won't become anything special till this time and will continue to be more of a collection of kingdoms and administrative capitals more so than an Empire, at least for a little while. Maybe I should see about using the Eastern Barbarian civ as the Parthians...

Also, I would like to include the Indus valley, plus what is now present day Turkmenistan. I found an interesting blip about what happened to the captured Romans after the battle of Carrhae. Apparently they eventually become mercenaries in the employ of the Chinese...

[Cyrion]

Originally posted by Harry Tuttle
I don't know about including the early encountered Gallic tribes like the Allemanni, Quadi, and Marcomanni. While they did play a large part in early Roman history I don't know if making them seperate from the typical Gallic Celt will lend a lot to the scenario. Due to the small size of Western Europe and the later tribes that probably should be mentioned it might become too much to include.

Not 100% sure, but I thought they were Germans, and not Gauls??

I love your idea about the later Romans and the change from standard infantry to mounted cavalry. I haven't given too much thought as to techs or obsolescance of wonders, but I'm open to ideas. I think Leo's workshop will be perfect.

Once again, I'm not a specialist, but I think the later romans should still be infantry, but not as good as before!

Also, I would like to include the Indus valley, plus what is now present day Turkmenistan. I found an interesting blip about what happened to the captured Romans after the battle of Carrhae. Apparently they eventually become mercenaries in the employ of the Chinese...

Would you believe me if I told you I have in the pipe a scenario about the tribulations of some of those defeated romans??

It is fully fictional and has nothing to do with the Chinese (though I read about this too!), and I even started to work on it last year, and have a rough sketch of the scen!

I'll probably finish it next year!

[Arthedain]

I agree on Map #2. You should use MapEdit to cut it Harry. If you need any help with it, there's alot of us who can.

We need more miniscens!

[fairline]

Originally posted by Harry Tuttle

@Fairline: The time period I was thinking of would be roughly 220 BC to 250 AD. So really, I'm thinking of having it begin at the outset of the Second Punic War and end at the typical Fall of the Empire. Actually, what am I talking about - It's the span of Roman dominance. I'm not too hellbent on depicting events exactly as they occured, just basic power structure. This is somewhat open ended after all.

You'll need to go to the 5th Century for the Fall of the Western Roman Empire; The Goths deposed the last Western Emperor Romulus Augustulus in 476AD, although he was only 'Emperor' of a rump that didn't extend much beyond Ravenna. You might choose the mid-5th Century when the Huns invaded or perhaps the final division of East and West Empires in the early 5th Century. Although the 3rd century saw a mass of civil wars and general disorder, things picked up again under Diocletian in the late 3rd Century and the Western Empire was a pretty cohesive entity until the migration period in the mid/late 4th Century.

I don't know about including the early encountered Gallic tribes like the Allemanni, Quadi, and Marcomanni. While they did play a large part in early Roman history I don't know if making them seperate from the typical Gallic Celt will lend a lot to the scenario. Due to the small size of Western Europe and the later tribes that probably should be mentioned it might become too much to include.

These were Germanic tribes not Celts; the Franks, Vandals and Goths et al were other Germanic tribes that encroached on the empire much later (4th Century onwards). I guess the earlier tribes could be covered by generic early Germans.

I like the Sarmatians, Alans, Parthians, and Iberians as additonal tribes. They will be perfect. The Sassanians are a bit far along, so I think they might have to be left off for now.

The Parthians were overthrown by the Sassanids in the 220s AD, so they were Rome's main enemy in the East from this time until being defeated during the Arab conquest.

You're correct about the settler and warrior combination. Though, I was planning of using some of the buildings from Curt's cities to depict settlements. Plus, the settlements won't have the settler flag, so no eventual cities.

I love your idea about the later Romans and the change from standard infantry to mounted cavalry. I haven't given too much thought as to techs or obsolescance of wonders, but I'm open to ideas. I think Leo's workshop will be perfect.

Glad you like it - this change started under Diocletian in the late 4th Century, so if you run to 250AD it's not relavent.

I want to include the Seleucid Empire in the scenario. I wasn't until Pompeii took Syria in 64 BC that the Empire finally fell. The Parthians won't become anything special till this time and will continue to be more of a collection of kingdoms and administrative capitals more so than an Empire, at least for a little while. Maybe I should see about using the Eastern Barbarian civ as the Parthians...

It was the rise of Parthia that did for the Seleucids - they steadily took land in the East from the Seleucids from the late 3rd Century BC onwards, and became Rome's main enemy in the East from the defeat of Crassus at Carrhae onwards. You have to include them

[Harry Tuttle]

@Fairline & Cyrion: Alright, alright, they were Germans

Ok, tell you what, we'll bring it out to 550 AD so we can include the new legion variations. You're right, the time period should extend farther out, well past the division. It'll be a lot more interesting anyways.

Also, I think I can change the Eastern Barb civ to the Parthians. Might as well since they basically took everything over. I might have them start with only a few military units and have them invade initially, or maybe just a settler unit or two.


I also want to include a few terrain types that would be landmarks of a sort. I've already created a Teutoburg Forest tile and the Pyramids at Giza. I have one more to use, but I can't think of what to depict. Does anyone have any ideas?

[curtsibling]

How about to 700AD?

I would like to see if I can hold out against the enemy and make Rome last an extra 100 years!!!

[Harry Tuttle]

Wellll, I guess we could do that, but by this time we'll be increasing the number of tribes present on the board. I don't know if we'll have room for the Avars and Turks.

[fairline]

Not to mention the Arabs.........I'd go with an earlier date as you say.

Here's what I was thinking for the change to the late Roman Field Army system: Use Leo to convert existing Legions and Auxilia to Limitanei when a Tech is awarded around 280-300 AD (call it Reforms of Diocletian or whatever). With this Tech also give the player a single powerful infantry unit (Legio Palatina) and cavalry unit(Vexillationes Palatinae). If you have room in your units file it would be interesting to make these unbuildable but allow the player to build regular field army units (Legio Comitatensis infantry and Vexillationes Comitatensis cavalry) with lower stats than the Palatine units but much higher than Limitanei.

This probably takes up too many unit slots (5), so alternatively just have cheap + crappy Limitanei and expensive but hard as nails Comitatus infantry and cavalry. You could perhaps throw in cataphracts as buildable in the later Field Army.

[curtsibling]

ToT should have plenty of unit slots to spare!

[Harry Tuttle]

Yeah the Arabs were just sort of thrown in when I was brainstorming. They'll have to go.

I like the second option for the late period units. We can't afford to use too many slots after all. As Curt said, we could do this in ToT, but let's not get carried away just yet. The scenario has to be created first.

So what do we have now for the Romans?

Velites?
Early Infantry? (Hastati/Principes/Triarii)
Early Legionnaires?
Roman Cavalry?
Limitanei? (Meat)
Legio Palatina? (Infantry)
Vexillationes Palatinae? (Cavalry)
Siege Weapons?
Cataphracts? (Could this be a generic unit?)

[Harry Tuttle]

Barbarian List (in rough order of Historical Arrival):

Gauls
Germans (Marcomanni, Allemani, Quadi)
Britons (For MGE if Britain is to have a seperate unitcreated-upon unitkilled-event)
Iberians
Numidians
Bosporans
Dacians
Sarmatians
Alans
Parthians
Franks
Saxons
Ostrogoths
Visigoths
Vandals
Huns
Burgundians?
Lombards (Langobards)?

edit: sp