NEW Rome 281 B.C. - 400 A.D.

[curtsibling]

Looking cool!

Working at your own pace is best, plenty of time!

One thing we know here in SL, is that good scens cannot be rushed...

[McMonkey]

Thanks Curt

Need to take a wee rest and recharge the batteries, my head is full of ideas fot the Vietnam scenario at the moment but I know that this will spawn new stuff for the ancient game so it is all good!

I have the map ready, the units ready, the events in planning stage and the tech tree finished so, all in all this scenario is looking rather healthy!

[McMonkey]

Pheonix from the flames

Just an update on this old idea if anyone is interested.

I stopped work on this eons ago (probably a few months in RL!) to concentrate on my still unfinished Vietnam scenario. It was originally being designed for MGE but I had a feeling that ToT would work much better but I had no time to work on it. It has been gathering dust since.

I have recently got involved in PBEM and in particular a game of John Ellis' excellent Hellas over at Civ Webring. This has inspired me to dust of this project and make it a PBEM game which is much easier to complete as there is no need to compensate for the AI.

It will be in the MGE format which is the excepted medium for online Civ gaming. I wanted to post here as there is much more creativity wafting about here at Apoly. If anyone has and comments, ideas or wants to have a look at the files then let me know.

The tech tree is done, which in my opinion is the hardest part of designing a game. I am working on the events which will mainly be used for creating barbarians, raiders and pirates.

When the game is finished I will post the files at the Scenario League.

One thing I need some ideas for is the Wonders. I have not assigned any yet and I don't want to play safe by assigning them all at the beginning of the game.
I therefore need some universal names for the wonders that could be built by Celts and Carthaginians alike.

Peace

[McMonkey]

And the inevitable screenshot!

White=Rome
Green=Carthage
Orange=Macedonian Greek
Pink=Barbarians (AI)

Other nations are:
Light Blue=Seleucid Greeks
Yellow=Ptolemic Greeks
Dark Blue=Germanics
Brown=Celts

Events create such peoples as Dacians, Illyrians, Numidians, Thracians, Skythians etc...

[GhostOfDisco]

Also, I see you're using BeBro's city graphics. I know curtsibling's got a good number of isometic city graphics for this era (including some cool Roman graphics) that I think would be better. As for terrain, have you looked at what Eivind has done with MGE terrain? My US Civil War 2013 scenario uses his kind of terrain, as well as his MGE conversion of Curt's "mderun USA" city graphics.

And what are you going to do with Christianity? I always get a laugh when you are able to research the faith in the years before Jesus walked the earth. I dunno. Maybe do something that makes it available only after 33 AD or something (and is there any way to simulate the choice of persecution, toleration and endorsement?) Just wondering.

Looks like a good scenario. I'll help if I can.

[McMonkey]

Re: Christianity
As I have no real idea how quickly real players will develop technologies I am not even going to try and dictate when Christianity arrives. I think I will just make it the Future Tech for now, until a better idea comes along.

This has made me think though. If I start the game in 271 B.C. and have one year per turn will the dates go into A.D. when the blessed child was born historically?

Re: Terrains / Cities
I like the Cities but I may well include an alternative set as someone else has mentioned it. I do not intend toi change the terrain as it is exactly as I like it, stuff everyone else

[Patine]

Another thing you might consider is that, after the fall from popularity of the Jovian Pantheon, Gnosticism and Mithrianiam rivalled Christianity for growing prominence in the Empire, until Constantine defeated Diocletus. Thus, as historical tangents go, Christianity may not have been the only option (despite what their verbose proponents tell us).

[GhostOfDisco]

Originally posted by Werd100
Re: Christianity
As I have no real idea how quickly real players will develop technologies I am not even going to try and dictate when Christianity arrives. I think I will just make it the Future Tech for now, until a better idea comes along.

This has made me think though. If I start the game in 271 B.C. and have one year per turn will the dates go into A.D. when the blessed child was born historically?

I think so, but I'm not sure. Maybe I'll do some experimenting or something.

[Turno]

Many of the hellenistic units you sampled looked that way after the battle of Magnesia and Apamea peace times ( 146 BC ).

Look here for better infos and graphics.

Plus, in 281 BC - 14 years after Sentinum, "the battle of the nations", Samnites league had his back broken and were no such great treath to Rome. And Latins were no longer a threat to Rome since Lake Regillum battle's day.

If you want to place them anyway, the Samnites Pentrian tribes main center ( or better centers, since they were scattered like italian Celts in a moltitude of "vici, tecta castellaque") was on Mons Tifernus. An hell of a place, i have seen it many times. Gorges, canyons, scarpades everywhere... and a lot of hidden passages. An hell on earth, simply and bluntly.

[McMonkey]

Thanks for the info Turno

I love the description of the Mons Tifernus. A lot of the cities are located where Roman ones would be. The concept was to name them after the local tribe and when the Romans capture them the player would rename the city (list provided with dl).

To be honest, an accurate scenario covering this whole period would be very difficult to make and was one of the reasons the original single player version stalled. With ToT it may be more feasible with the extra units and events.

What I hope to do is make a decent multiplayer game and thoroughly test it against human opponents. I will keep notes and ideas and may come back to the single player game one day and try to make it work.

I have come to the (personal) conclusion that the best single player scenarios need to be focused on specific areas and events (as it the case in Frederick the Great) to allow for the greatest challenge for the player.
My love of huge maps makes it difficult to design a game that is challenging for the human player and does not go on for many months!

I think the larger maps are fine for PBEM games as human players will eliminate the AI's inadequacies.

[Turno]

PS many Roman cities were founded later then your scen begins. IE Venusia and Canusium - nowadays Venosa and Canosa di Puglia - , 280 BC ( as a siege belt against Samintes ), or Ariminum - nowadays Rimini - 279 BC. ( as a center to controll the freshly divided Ager Senonicus along with Sena Gallica, nowadays Senigallia ). But since Civ2 AI is pretty stupid and doesn't found colonies on its own when ordered to do so... it's ok, i think.

[McMonkey]

My concept is to have barbarian cities in the location of later Roman colonies but given the name of the local tribe. I will provide a list of tribe names=Roman city names. In this way as the Romans capture them they can be renamed and will give an idea of the Empire. Obviously some cities will be captured earlier or later than the historical founding but I don't see this as a major problem.

As the first version will be for PBEM things will vary greatly. Maybe the Celtic / Germanic player will hold on to their villages or capture ones from the Barbarians. Such is the way of Civ II.

I intend to use the PBEM game as a playtest and figure out a good balance for a SP game where I can a lot a lot of the Barbarian cities to the non Roman nations. For the PBEM version I have tried to give most mediterranean civs 10 cities, the Romans 5 and the Celtic / Germanic civs 20.

I may decide to leave the SP version for a while to finish off my Vietnam and Balkans projects. The Balkans one would also work well as a PBEM game for the testing phase as it does not need much altering as the main playable nations are already very balanced. Vietnam will remain as a single player game but still needs a lot of work doing to it.

After playing Techumseh's FTG scenario I have had a bit of a rethink of the way I design SP games. His focus on a specific area, rather than a whole region seems to make a lot of sense as the gameplay is a lot more intense. I have been thinking about a Peninsula War SP game but I really want to finish my other projects before starting anything new. I also need to read up on the period as it would be a very complicated game to build.

[McMonkey]

Just to illustrate my concept I have included this map.

Brown = Celts
Dark Blue = Germanic (inc. Dacian / Skythian / Sarmatian)
Orange = Macedonian Greeks
Yellow = Ptolemic Greeks
Light Blue = Seleucid Greeks
Olive Green = Carthaginians
White = Roman
Tan = Barbarian / Independent

[Turno]

I think you can use this RTW world map for reference, but please keep in mind that:

a ) The southern two third of Germany, plus Austria and Hungary, central Spain, the whole Po plain in Italy, central Thrace and central Turkey, were under Celtic control.

b ) Germanic tribes were extended to the whole mid and south of Scandinavian nations, Finland excluded.

c ) Microasiatic cities were under Seleucid's control, except Rodi.

d ) Parthia in 264 BC was still to begin his quest for power, so it controlled only Parthia and Hyrcania - nowadays Khorasan.

[McMonkey]

Could anyone tell me the quickest and easiest way to cover the map and reveal different parts for the nations in a scenario?

I remember reading that a change to the rules to make a unit into a move 99 a/c would do the trick. Once done I would restore that units normal stats.

I am not so sure of the best way to go about the whole process. Do I select cover entire map then save as scenario, then reveal the areas required and save as scenario again?

I will experiment with this myself now but any assistance would be appreciated!