My next mod project will be a mod based on the Greek and Roman epics: the Illiad, the Odyssey, and the Aeneid.

Here is my conversation with Ocedius about it:

my next mod is going to be based on the Illiad. Some theoretical details (key word theoretical) are:

*Divine intervention in the affairs of men.
*Two playable civs: Greeks and Trojans (maybe will divide into Agammemnon
and Achilles but I dont know yet)
*New improvements to improve historical defense values of the city of Troy

WOULD LOVE ANY IDEAS/MAPS/UNITS/ANIMATIONS!
My firend, you'll need a lot more than city animations for this mod. Lets see, you'll need Collosi, hyda, cyclops, centuars, minotaurs .......
i was thinking of using the AoM units, other myth units, Kinboat's Achilles, some Firaxis units, this scythe as a plague named "Wrath of Hades" or somethin', the spell units, and many more. Would you like to help with organization,etc?
Most definately. I started something like this 2 years back but there were only a handful of units available so I dropped it. I have modded multiple units of mythical capacities in my .biq, but they are mostly spell type with additional sounds or .flcs. For this mod, you'd need something like

1) winged harpies. Naval, sink in sea/ocean (Cruise missles)
2) Rain of fire (nuclear weapon)
3) Earthquake (nuclear weapon)
4) Collosi. Wheeled, high A/D/HP. Radar (Slow moving tanks)
5) Shades. a ragged/cloaked figure. (Cruise missle, enslave to produce shade)
6) Whirlpools (preplaced immobile naval units) High D, 0 A
7) Cyclops. Ignore terrain
8) Curse of Circe Enslaves units to sheep + Nuclear weapon (I am using spell effects followed by a sheep sound file to do this though it has yet to work properly )
9) Amazons Lots and lots of Amazons
10) Kraken (I use the giant squid in my mod)
11) Large (240 x 240) weather effects, rain, storm, fog (Like fog of war) preplaced, immobile and hiding invisible units
12) Neptune/Psidon (the one in the unit lib is kinda lacking. Needs more omph)
13) Preplaced treasure units and some treasure like booby traps. I call mine treasure# where # is a space in the name. This allows the name to appear identical, but when you try and capture it, it blows up (10 bombard, 0 range and leathal) Nasty bugger
14) Multiple leaders (and Oracle like flag units)
15) Units that are colled identical to terrain so they appear invisible and named 'suspisious lands' or something. Stepping on them causes a defensive result. You get the idea.
16) Wrath of Gods. Plagues etc. I am using a modieifed tornado.flc for this. Looks cheesy but its better than nothing.

...................


The lists is nearly endless, but I'll help if you need it.
your ideas are amazing! i may have to extend my scenario to include the Odyssey and the Aeneid! haha Im going to start a new thread so as not to clog up this already great thread. please go there for details and to assist me. thanks!

this is as far as I have gotten so far on the mod. i am looking for people who can actually physically work on the mod (besides myself obviously).

I will most likely divide the help up into sections such as:

Joe does "Units" section in the editor.
Bob does "Improvements/Wonders" section in the editor.
Mike does the map.
Peter does the "civilizations" section in the editor.
etc, etc, etc

Note: those were made-up names

If you would like to work on a certain section, let me know via email, pm, or just reply to the thread.

Thanks a million if you can help in any way!


And dont forget! Advice is help, too!


------------------
Last thing (i promise :D): Unit creators, people familiar with the C3C editor, and map makers are especially needed and welcome!

Check these threads for more details/requests/etc..........

1 (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?p=2119054#post2119054)
2 (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=97696)
3 (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=97694)

I'm interested. :)

great! what can you do?

Unfortunately, the best I can do is simply offer advice and ideas at this time. I don't have any web space available and I don't have any graphics programs. :(

thats ok. are you familiar with the C3C editor? if you are you can create a map or input units into a .biq file or work on Pediaicons or Civilopedia entries. would you do any of these?

It's a really GREAT idea :goodjob:

If you need somebody to do the maps... ;)

yes yes! i do! i need a map of the world in the eyes of the Greeks! around the time that they were attacking Troy. PLEASE!

I just posted a map based on Erathostene's map :
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=97693

I'll search for ancient maps of Greece and the Mediterranean. The most difficult is to find it, after that, I just need a couple of days.

I will most likely divide the help up into sections such as:

Joe does "Units" section in the editor.
Bob does "Improvements/Wonders" section in the editor.
Mike does the map.
Peter does the "civilizations" section in the editor.
etc, etc, etc

Note: those were made-up names

If you would like to work on a certain section, let me know via email, pm, or just reply to the thread. Thanks a million if you can help in any way!

And dont forget! Advice is help, too!


If you need someone for units/improvements in the pedia, I think I can help. Just tell me what you want to start with and I can try these. Unfortunately I am as good with making .flcs, as a baby is guarding candy; it ain't gonna happen :P

Additionally, you need something like a city called Mt. Olympus, surrounded with a landmark/upaceabble terrain. This civ would be called gods/titans, and produce wrath-of-the-gods type nukes only. Each nuke costs something like 5/6 population, so when the city reaches this point, it can crank up a wrath (plague, earthquake, rain of fire, meteors). It is a locked alliance with another civ, something like amazons, both of which have a mutual protection pact, and are at locked conflict with all other civs.

Other civs are equally divided into 3 alliances (locked), and the coalition-victory flag must be active so civs have to work together or perish.

Just me 6 rupees on the matter :)

VERY NICE IDEA! i may even use it in a completely different mod to generate weather! sweet!!!!!!!

i dont need pedia yet but ill put you down as the one to do it. can you also enter them physically into the editor. if each person does one or two sections in the editor i can import them all into one file. thats my reasoning behind my planning.

From earlier:
I just posted a map based on Erathostene's map :
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=97693

I'll search for ancient maps of Greece and the Mediterranean. The most difficult is to find it, after that, I just need a couple of days.
From PM message:
Ok, I'm in charge. If you find maps ( I mean jpg, gif,... ) of that time, please tell me. It's gonna be the most difficult part : to find ancient maps.

here are some image files for you! thanks a billion!

i dont need pedia yet but ill put you down as the one to do it. can you also enter them physically into the editor. if each person does one or two sections in the editor i can import them all into one file. thats my reasoning behind my planning.

I'm not quite sure what you mean here. The file is a .txt file and pedia entries are entered as text and saved to it. I am using CEC, maybe thats why I feel its easier to make entries to the file.

what i mean is, would you enter the units into the editor and give them stats, etc? i wasnt talking about pedia at all that time.

what i mean is, would you enter the units into the editor and give them stats, etc? i wasnt talking about pedia at all that time.

I am pretty sure that can't be done. Each file is unique so data can't be imported, atleast not for C3C.

what? im sorry but i am terribly confused. I am asking if you can:

1) Open C3CEdit
2) Enable custom rules
3) Open Rules editor
4) Go to Units tab
5) Click 'add'
6) Type in a name
7) Give unit stats
8) Repeat

Pedia editing will come later.

can you do it for me? or another tab(s)? if you do then i can import the 'units' section of the rules to a final biq.

ps- i will use you for pedia editing later if you still dont mind

pps- are you in invisible mode?

for that, YES. :) Thats pretty much how I started the Mongol Domination mod.

wait a sec. Now I am confused. Firstly lemme double check becuase I am most definately certain .biq are independent unique non-importable entities in Civ III regardless of version. The map may be imported using utilities, but not the rules. But let me check.

Who me Invisible. Ofcourse not ! :blush: :mischief:

Who me Invisible. Ofcourse not ! :blush: :mischief:
haha

and yes... rules, player settings, scenario settings, and map settings can be imported

Who me Invisible. Ofcourse not ! :blush: :mischief:
haha

and yes... rules, player settings, scenario settings, and map settings can be imported using just the editor that shipped with C3C

DAMN THE *@#*$&(* Import option. Its tucked away under the file option in the menu :mad:

Wasn't there Ethiopians at Troy, who sided with the Trojans? Or am I totally off...

I don't recall any Ethiopians in the Trojan War. Why would they bother marching all the way to Anatolia from Ethiopia for a civilization that they'll rarely ever interact with? ;)

Troy was pretty much alone, but they were extremely powerful. Historically, Troy was the major power in the region and controlled much of the trade, thus it was a very wealthy city as well.

right. it also had very very strong walls. siege was almost pointless.

Are you planning to have each civ start out with a "Hero" unit that upgrades (like the Shogun unit in the "Sengoku" scenario)?

You could use some of the "Fortress" units here to represent the Walls of Troy. They should have huge HP bonuses and high defense power. :)

Yes I am sure that is how this mod will start. Each hero upgrading with additional techs; becoming stronger (HP and A/D). And yes, fortress walls will be incorporated but not by me. I am working on the Chaos Trees right about now.

I don't recall any Ethiopians in the Trojan War. Why would they bother marching all the way to Anatolia from Ethiopia for a civilization that they'll rarely ever interact with? ;)

Troy was pretty much alone, but they were extremely powerful. Historically, Troy was the major power in the region and controlled much of the trade, thus it was a very wealthy city as well.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trojan_war

according to this, they had quit a few allies...Maybe they were a vassal of the Hittites, and its actually just others vassals, or I think, Ethiopia was often just a generic name for subsaharah Africa....But then again they also list the Amazons as their allies so who knows...

I love the idea ... I could ... arrrg... help encoding items in the ... arrg... editor (have done that all weekend for my poor mod anyway :nospam: )

But!!! My knowledge with the Illiad and Odyssey stops short of nothing (there was of course this movie...). We really need a good discussion first on the main buildings/advances/units to be incorporated (so I can't start now, :) )

Look at this map:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=71817&perpage=20&display=&pagenumber=1

My map!!!:D

But I don't think it's suited to the task. I think Ossric's Ancient Grecce map would do just fine.:)

Actually I am pretty sure the map will have to be redon, possibly started from scratch. The mod will have to be entertaining for more than 2-3 runs/campains, so theres a big chance that they'll be 3 maps each with a larger size than the other, more obstacles, and hopefully, more gameplay. :)

I posted a map of Greece there : http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?p=2121553#post2121553

What about using the etheral/Ethereal as the shades unit? Its in both the X-COM and MoM mods.

@ ocedius
maybe the ethereal. the graphic is not too hot but it could work. first enlighten me with more details about these "shades". Also, unless someone wants to make a new map for this mod, I think that the maps already suggested would work. (at least for the first scenario in this 3-Campaign Mod)

@pinktilapia
im sry but i will have to accept your offer and sign you up for editor work. thanks a billion! :lol: :D You will have some break as we talk about this mod further.

im going to post a second reply now. It will have details accumulated so far......

“Spurn not the dreams that come through the Righteous Gate [from the dead]: when righteous dreams come, they have the weight of truth. By night we [the ghosts of the dead] drift abroad, night frees imprisoned Shades, and even Cerberus casts aside his chains and strays.” –Propertius 4.7

Double post. Sorry :crazyeye:

“Spurn not the dreams that come through the Righteous Gate [from the dead]: when righteous dreams come, they have the weight of truth. By night we [the ghosts of the dead] drift abroad, night frees imprisoned Shades, and even Cerberus casts aside his chains and strays.” –Propertius 4.7

Shades are ghosts, often dipicted as ghostly figures. In AoM, they appear as cloaked floating blackened skeletal torsos. Wow that was a lot of descriptors

------------------------
The Ancients Mod
------------------------

This mod will be based upon the Greek mythological epics The Illiad and The Odyssey as well as the Roman epic The Aeneid.

This mod is really a campaign. It will contain three distinct scenarios (one per epic) with three different objectives. They will most likely be released as a pack but may be released as single scenarios. The former is preffered. Beta testers and the design crew may have the mod pre-release. However, they will be strongly warned NOT to distribute, release, or otherwise share this mod until I, the100thballoon give permission.

-----
Completed Components
-----
Leaderheads are complete but I must narrow them down.
The following units are complete:
Achilles King Unit
Earthquake
Whirlpools
Curse of Circe
Sheep unit
Kraken
Neptune/Poseidon
Plague animations
Hydra
Centaurs
Minotaur

-----
Components Under Investigation
-----
These components are either semi-completed, their use is being debated, or they exist somewhere on Civfanatics and are being tracked down:

Bad Terrain (units identical to terrain)
Bad treasure (units identical to goody huts)
Cyclops (possibly a troll unit from MoM)

Amenhotep7's Map (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=71817&perpage=20&display=&pagenumber=1)
MaisseArsouye's Map (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?p=2121553#post2121553)

Chukchi Husky's Trojan City Graphics based on a picture provided by the100thballoon

-----
Incomplete/Needed Components
-----
These components DO NOT EXIST YET to my knowledge.

Units:
Agammemnon King Unit (if possible would like a Munit with Menelaus to be in it too)
Priam King Unit (King of Troy)
Helen Flag/Princess Unit (Greek maiden, very beautiful)
Winged harpies
Firey Rain (like flaming hail or something; may not be used)
Collosi (see Ocedius for details)
Shades (see Ocedius for details)
Weather (like rain, fog, storms)

Town and City Graphics for the Trojans.

T/C/M Graphics for the Greek states.

-----
Jobs
-----

MAIN

Administrator: the100thballoon
Design/Ideas: the100thballoon, Ocedius

UNITS

Ideas/Design: the100thballoon, Ocedius
Creation: the100thballoon, Ocedius
Conversions: the100thballoon
Units 32 Icons: NONE YET!!!

LEADERHEADS

Ideas: the100thballoon
Creation: ???

MAPS

Ideas: the100thballoon, Ocedius
Creation: MaisseArsouye

EDITOR WORK

Input: the100thballoon, pinktilapia
Compilation/Output: the100thballoon

PEDIA WORK

Entries in Civilopedia: the100thballoon, Ocedius
Entries in PediaIcons: the100thballoon
Civilopedia Icons:

INTERFACE AND MISC.

Resources (possibly removed all together):
Interface:
Misc. PCX Files (such as draft, buttons):

----------------------------------------------------------------

NOTE: These details are changeable and most likely will change before the mod is complete. If you wish to sign up for a spot please reply to this forum, pm me, or email me. All members are welcome! Please join the effort!

maybe for shades I, you, or someone else can color convert one of the skeleton units and/or add foggy effects to it.

Great you completed the whirlpool color transition. Kudos. :)

why are you using posiedon as a unit; it seems rather stupid to have a God as a unit that can be destroyed.

why are you using posiedon as a unit; it seems rather stupid to have a God as a unit that can be destroyed.

Neptune/Posidon..posedon.. um the big blue guy will be used as a God unit. 0 transport, radar, 3 moves, doesn't sink, offense flag on, 100 A/D, 255/0/10 B/R/RG. Hidden nationality. Unit of the gods civ. At permanent war with all other civs.

Aaarhg, I have been recruited :crazyeye: I start encoding Poseidon right now ;)

Aaarhg, I have been recruited :crazyeye: I start encoding Poseidon right now ;)


Encode away. :lol:

You can find greek cities here (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=97801)

If you want a complete pack with era-specific cities, it shouldn't be a problem...

that seems incredibly stuopid; why would the gods be at war with thier people?

there are cases in legend where the gods take action; but this is better epitmized as a tech, not a unit of a god.

that seems incredibly stuopid; why would the gods be at war with thier people?

there are cases in legend where the gods take action; but this is better epitmized as a tech, not a unit of a god.

Xen, firstly you, and everyone else, is entitled to an opinion. This after is a forum. That is why threads are posted here. :)

Secondly, there was no other way to display Psiedon. The mod is loosly based on myth, and a god of the seas fits well here.

Thirdly, there will be tech tree changes to incorporate the worship of gods, atleast I hope there are.

That said, do you have any ideas what should be done to the mod to make it more appealing to the masses? This is but one instance of unit use. How can one possible create a mod true to the illiad? It is 24 volumes long! It takes a semester to do a basic study of the work, let alone create a comprehensive mod on it.

Also this project is barely a week old. Things will change. Units/tech/resources .. nothing set in stone :mischief:

I hope we can get more input from you, you did say you were a Greek history/myth buff in a prior post didn't you? :)

Off-topic .. I agree with your sig 100% :goodjob:

haha good point! maybe i will use him as a volcano replacement. im thinking of converting the volcano graphics to look exactly like coastal graphics. then the eruption animation will be the whirlpool and the pollution will look like.......i dunno yet (this is only a very beta idea) maybe little whirlpools???? :lol: probably not but just an idea...... also, units wouldnt be able to cross these sqaures but of course that can be achieved anyway..........

@Ocedus; the Illiad is 24 volums long, but each volum is looslly anagous to a moder books "chapters"; a good translation of the Illiad (read a literal translation as opposed to the over poetic fruity non-sense of the enlightnement era translations) can be read in a day of thourough reading, or around a week of casual reading (literal translations are the way to go, for we must remember that Homers epic is merelly a poem to us; to his audience, it was told in every day terms, and so to get the true impact of the story, it needs to be translated into everyday terms for our language)

that said, i see little to no reason to have the gods running about in the scenario anymore then it woudl make sense to have a jesus unit runnign about in the middle ages, to represent christianity...

its a little different than that. as in the Illiad, Gods take sides and more visibly (to the casual observer) interfere in the lives of Men. like i said though he may drop his "unit" status and become a new "disaster" in the Odyssey scenario or may take on a new form each scenario. like Ocedius has said before, this mod is still in beta form.

@Ocedus; the Illiad is 24 volums long, but each volum is looslly anagous to a moder books "chapters"; a good translation of the Illiad (read a literal translation as opposed to the over poetic fruity non-sense of the enlightnement era translations) can be read in a day of thourough reading, or around a week of casual reading (literal translations are the way to go, for we must remember that Homers epic is merelly a poem to us; to his audience, it was told in every day terms, and so to get the true impact of the story, it needs to be translated into everyday terms for our language)

that said, i see little to no reason to have the gods running about in the scenario anymore then it woudl make sense to have a jesus unit runnign about in the middle ages, to represent christianity...

Xen, go away!! :D J/K. Yes I do have a copy of that blasted book, and its the more-or-less fruity translation and not the abridged read-it-like-the-newspaper version. I took it as an elective a couple of years back.

Also, things are still evolving. There is no way in hell anyone can make a mod that represents the Illiad acurately. Thats why it will be a fantasy mod with the creator(s) deciding on the extent of divine intervention.

Xen, go away!! J/K. Yes I do have a copy of that blasted book, and its the more-or-less fruity translation and not the abridged read-it-like-the-newspaper version. I took it as an elective a couple of years back.

Also, things are still evolving. There is no way in hell anyone can make a mod that represents the Illiad acurately. Thats why it will be a fantasy mod with the creator(s) deciding on the extent of divine intervention.

right.

ps- Xen, PLEASE stay!

I think it would be easier to work on the Illiad than on the Odyssey and Aeneid. The Illiad concentrates on the final years of the Trojan war, which could be reinacted in civilisation, but the Odyssey and Aeneid concentrate on mainly one person on a quest reliant on events and certain things to happen, which would be quite hard to do in civilisation.

maybe so. i was considering that but lets finish the Illiad first and then decide what we are going to do about the Odyssey and Aeneid. I may drop the Odyssey and make the Aeneid into two parts: the Carthage adventure and the colonization of Italy.

hey everybody! remember this great mod idea? wanna resurrect it? i just found some walls that we can use for Troy!!!!!!!!!! im so excited and happy that i want to start this thing up again. heres the link:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=103993

gimme some feed back!

Do you have a map? :)

i do not. would you like to create one? (hint hint PLEASE)

We now have enough city graphics, due to Skam0073, RedAlert and some others.

If you want a specific map, I agree to do it. I could work with varwnos who knows Greece better than I. Give me a picture of the area you want and you get a first map within a few hours ;)

Maisse's maps of the area are great + he already has some made. So i think that he could be the better choise, unless you want a map that would be based on my already made Greece map, made bigger so as to have a part of coastal asia minor. But in that case i warn you that it will be quite big, since the map as it is is 150*196. Ofcourse it doesnt have to be very bigger than that if you do not wan all of the western areas of it.

the region i want is greece and turkey and a little bit north. the southern most point i would want would be something like the sinai peninsula. main things i need are greece and turkey. where are these city graphics i am hearing about?

For city graphics, check the library. It's complete !
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=100866

I made a greek pack with 5 different greeck city graphics, ready to play !
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=100773

My maps are here (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=2227854&postcount=33) but I don't think there's something good for this scenario. I'll make a new one. I understood the north and south limits of what you want. But what about east and west ? I think it would be nice to include Lebanon, Palestine and Israel on the east side. On the west side, do you stop after Greece or do you want some parts of Italy ? Odysseus was sensed to go to Djerba and Sicily, so it would be nice to include it.

I think

the map focus as of now is for the Illiad ONLY. im so busy that i want to take this one part at a time. i am only worrying about the Illiad portion right now. so for the map i need turkey and greece. i guess a northern limit could be set just above the greek/balkan penninsula and a southern limit could be set to the nile delta. western limit would be half of italian penninsula and eastern limit i guess would be no further east than half way through present day syria.

I think that you are right to limit this to parts, but perhaps you should moreover only bother yourself with doing one scenario, since no person could really produce a trilogy of scenarios of high level. I would never attempt anything of the sort anyway, such a mountain of work would be visible from any window of any room one would try to occupy for the time he is making the scen.

The Illiad iirc is only about a small part of the trojan war, infact it starts with the anger of Achilleas due to the death of his friend Patroclos by Hector. So in reality if you only wanted to depict that you dont need a map of Greece or Asia Minor, but only of Troy.
For an Odyssey scen you would need a map that has the aegean, the Messena straights, and the ionian sea (although i think that the locations where the Odyssey takes part arent known for sure).

Maybe you want to depict not the Illiad, but the entire Trojan war? In that case you would need a map of Greece and coastal asia minor.

btw: why do you need Sinai? i could be wrong, but i dont think it is related to the Illiad or Odyssey, althogh like i said no one really knows where the different places the Odyssey took place were.

What about this ?

http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/odysseus1.jpg

@Maisse
thats good but a little more north and east. just barely. i want the land route to troy visible too.

@varnwos
good point. i had forgotten.

@Everyone
**NEW GAMEPLAN** ONE Scenario over the entire Trojan War.

I just made this :
http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads8/odysseus_180.jpg

you can find it there (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=105962)

perfect! now if i could only find the time to complete the storyline and rest of the mod......