New barbarian cities

From the 'Nine Ideas' thread (The quote below is taken from the 'Nine Ideas' thread (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=190934)...

lumpthing said:

I would like to see more cities in sub-saharan Africa. At the moment this has the feel of the Americas or Australia, where European diseases destroyed already very sparse populations and meant colonization was mostly a matter of settlement rather than dominating existing populations. This was not the case with Africa, and I know there were many minor cities in the southern half of Africa. Maybe the same should also be done for the South-East Asian archipelago (Indonesia etc) as well, since they also had dense native populations.

Click to expand...

rhye said:

if you know know any city in a non major-civ's area worth to be included, please tell its name/location/date/owner.

Click to expand...

So this thread is for suggesting new cities, either barbarian or as minor civs, which will enhance the feel of Rhye's and Fall of Civilization.

Rhye's Restrictions:
1) Cannot be in a playable civ's homeland.
2) There's no point suggesting cities that would spawn in area within another civ's cultural borders by the time of it's founding (e.g. Ethiopian cities cannot be included because Eygpt already dominates Ethiopia by the time its cities would be founded).


Proposals so far...

Malay Archipelago

• Brunei (or Brunei Town) – Founded 7th Century by indigenous people. Ruled extensive lands 15th – 17th Centuries. Under British influence/administration 1847-1984. Officially changed its name to Bandar Seri Begawan in 1970. Now the capital of the Sultanate of Brunei..
• Butuan – Founded by indigenous people by 10th Century. By 11th Century was the trading centre of the Philippines. Now the centre of the Philippines’ Caraga Region.
• Jakarta - founded by Hindus in the 4th Century as Sunda Kelapa. Major port of hindu kingdom. Conquered by muslims 1527, name changed to Jayakarta. It was later conquered by dutch and its named changed to Batavia, becoming Jakarta in 1942.
• Macassar (or Makassar) – Founded at least by 14th Century by indigenous people. It was a thriving trading port by 1500 AD. (http://www.indahnesia.com/indonesia/SUSUJU/the_old_makassar.php)
• Malacca - founded 1396 by a Srivijayan (Malay) prince from Sumatra. quickly became the pre-eminent port of the region. I really think Malacca should be in the game because of its role as the fabled gateway to the Eastern spice islands. (http://www.theepicentre.com/Spices/spicetrd.html) I know Singapore seems more significant looking at the 20th Century, but in the broad sweep of history, Malacca was more important and more iconic.
• Manila – Began as a Malay settlement called Maynilad and developed into a Muslim Sultanate ruling the local area. Founding date does not seem to be known, but it was a large and prosperous economic and political power base at least by the mid 16th Century. Destroyed and rebuilt by the Spanish as Manila in 1571 to become the capital of the Philippines.
• Padang – founded some time (sorry) by indigenous people. Rich trading city by the 16th Century. Conquered by Dutch 17th Century. Now capital of West Sumatra.
• Ternate – Founded 1257 AD as a Muslim Sultanate. Established political and economic dominance over most of the ‘Spice Islands’. Today it is the largest town in the Indonesian province of North Maluku. http://www.4dw.net/royalark/Indonesia/ternate.htm

Africa

• Antananarivo – Founded 1625 AD by the Hova, who soon became rulers of most of Madagascar. It remains the capital of that country today.
• Bulawayo - founded 1872 by the Ndbele. Today it is Zimbabwe's second city with a population of 676,000 http://www.bulawayo1872.com/history/index.htm
• Kismayu – founded by the Bajuni people. Couldn’t find a founding date, but I expect it’s around 1000 AD because the Bajuni were partly descended from Arabs. Today it’s Somalia's third-largest city.
• Quelimane – Founded around 10th Century by Swahili-speakers. Remains an important town today.
• Kanye - founded 1798 as the tribal capital of the Bangwaketse. Probably Botswana's most historically and culturally significant town. Also its seventh most populous ( 40,000 inhabitants) http://www.mmegi.bw/2005/April/Friday1/702755453623.html
• Zanzibar (or Zanzibar Town to be exact) – founded 12th Century (according to some tourist website I found; Crayton says 1000 AD) by Swahili-speakers. Remains important city today.

I've tried to be accurate with the positions and because of this, some of the cities are on mountains and resources. So I’ll leave it up to Rhye, should he add the cities, to decide whether convert mountains into hills and move resources or move the city locations.

Note: When a number of potential cities are close together I've prioritized ones that are still living cities today and were clearly not built by one of the civs. So Mombasa, Mozambique, Mombasa and Mogadishu were discounted because they were founded by Arabs; Sofala and Great Zimbabwe were discounted because they are now just ruins.

SadoMacho said:

The city Samarkand. Allthough the Persians, the Greeks, the Mongols and the Russians took it, it has been a mojor city, and often it was independent during history. It had great wealth because the silk route passed here.

Click to expand...

I don't think Samarkand should be included because, according to Wikipedia, it was founded by a Persian people.

Thinking about it, if minor civs were one day implemented I'd really like to see the Timurids. In the vanilla game Persia tends to disappear long before Timur would appear, and the Mongols rarely even reach Transoxiana or Persia in my experience. As well as giving us a nice Central Asian buffer, a strong Timurid dynasty could also represent the Mughal conquerors of India.



Actually I'm rather enthusiastic about this. Shame we didn't think of them during the minor civ discussions.

Samarkhand, Bukhara, etc... were founded by Persian/Turkish people; but, they were not founded by an empire, nor (for any length of period) controlled by an empire. They were independent, and I believe this would help facilitate the completion of a Silk Road.

A single Ethiopian city would be nice. It could even be named after the region if actual city names are too obscure.

A suggestion in another thread was Cahokia. Yes, this would provide a nice potential for an alternative Aztec/American History!

Mecca should probably be a Barbarian city. Even though it came to prominance after the rise of Islam, the Arabs still conducted trade in this urban area. The Byzantines and Sassanids both contemplated its future incorporation into their respective empires.

Knossos is on the list of Barbarian cities but is commented out. It may have hindered AI worker movement but if it doesn't, put it in there.

Xingxian, or the appropriate spelling of this northwestern Chinese city, was not incorporated into the Chinese empire until after the Han, during the Tang, dynasty.

Timbuktu could also appear earlier, but it is currently acceptable.

Pella, or a Macedonian city, upon the Greece spawn, perhaps.

We don't have a Swahili civ yet, so their cities would be nice; although historically they served mainly for trade, not government. Mombasa, Mogadishu, etc....

A single Ethiopian city would be nice. It could even be named after the region if actual city names are too obscure.

Click to expand...

Why resort to that when there are plenty of Ethiopian/Aksumite city names to use?

- the problem with ethiopia is that the region is covered by Egyptian culture by the time those cities should be founded, and I had put the condition that cities can't spawn within borders. I already tried. (I guess the same would happen with Macedonia and Greece)

- The problem with Knossos was that AI Greece loved to move its palace there.

- The problem with Mecca is that its founding date is unknown (otherwise I would have changed Arabian birth date)

- The problem with native american camps is that they would later become major American cities.

- Samarquand was persian

- I'm willing to hear any suggestion about native african cities that possibly still exist nowadays

Swahili cities were founded after 1000 AD. Occasionally Egypt or Arabia has claimed this coast by then. The greater majority of these cities exist to this day: Mogadishu, Kilwa, Zanzibar, Mombasa, etc...

Also, I still woudn't mind a single NA city, it will eventually become a major Aztec/French/American city if it doesn't get destroyed in the process. Perhaps our own timeline contains this rare occurance.

EDIT: here are some city founding dates; obviously all 4 could not be included
Mogadishu, 900AD
Zanzibar, 1000AD
Mombasa, 1050AD
Mozambique, 1200ADish
The date for Mozambique and other dates (not included here) coincide to the time Arab traders began patronizing these cities.

EDIT #2:
Yeah, the date given for Zanzibar was the colonization of the islands by Bantu (Swahili) speakers.

- the problem with ethiopia is that the region is covered by Egyptian culture by the time those cities should be founded, and I had put the condition that cities can't spawn within borders. I already tried. (I guess the same would happen with Macedonia and Greece)

Click to expand...

I wondered about this when Nubia was suggested as a minor civ. Egypt's third or fourth city tends to be at the heart of Nubian or Kushite lands, so how would it work if they were implemented from the start of the game?

Is there no way the AI could use the Camp units?

The city of Zimbabwe.

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

Allthough i'd like to see a Zulu MC, far away from all other civs, so they will not cause a lot of changes in the relations of other civs and they could be conquered by England.

Zulu could be good MC, it would take turns for musketmans/redcoats to crush armies of about 10 impis.

How about if you had barbs on goody huts where the nativs had a settlement that doesnt count as a city but then became a major colony, would it then be possible to program it to automatically turn into a city for however lands on it (i.e. conquors the barbs)?

goody huts are gone by far in the imperialism age.

but the concept is inspiring - it's similar to what I once proposed as french UP

I posted this in another thread, but this belongs here:
Before I go spouting off dozens of cities, I'd like to ask two questions:
1. Is it worth including cities that were very tiny, given the risk that the AI will make them ridiculously huge? I'm thinking mainly of Native American cities like Cahokia (Mississippian) and Canandaigua (Seneca).

2. Is it worth including cities that will be inside a civ's spawn zone, and have to flip when that civ spawns? For instance, Barbarian Massalia (Phoenecia) becoming Roman Massilia/French Marseille, Barbarian Erewan (Armenia) becoming Greek Ereban/Persian Iravaan/Arabic Yirīfān.

Maybe some chinese cities as barbarian, because china was not unified as we learned from warlords senario's?

I have often thought that multiple chinease civs should be available as it is more like a continent, minor civs maybe, but yeah barb cities sounds like a very good idea to me, it would make playing as china more challenging and interesting in the early game and would add a lot of historical accuracy...

I find the Chinese civilization has enough difficulties as it is. They would fall completely behind in technology and expansion. It would just be wasting more time between turns.

I too have pondered the idea of 2 separate Chinese civs, but I can never justify two distinct civ names. "Southern China" and "Northern China"? "Han" and "Tang"?

Though sometimes fragmented into rivaling kingdoms or dynasties from time to time, the Chinese culture has always remained united. The principles of the civil bureacracy, Confucian ideals and artistic stylings have always remained the same until the reign of Communism. The only signifigant moment when "Northern" and "Southern" chinese cultures began differing was when seperated between the Mongols and the Southern Song.

Anyway, I'm completely against seperate Chinese civilizations; too complicated.

The only reason why they would fall behind is because china is seriously toned down in the map, it should be about the size of europe and have almost every resaurce in the game if we were going for total realism...
..anyways I wouldnt suggest that but it might help chinease expansion like the barbs around rome?