Era Distinct Leaderheads

Steph's civ editor should allow civs to change their names and leaders throughout the eras.
My own personal mod, contains these civs:


Right now I am focusing on Ancient periods, which for my mod is Bronze, Iron, and Classical.
The problem is different regions went through different eras at different times, ie, Japan's bronze and iron age was in 300bc. While Europe's bronze age was around 2,000 bc. But I would like to find a balance between historical timelines, and technological eras. ie, I would like Mexico's Aztecs to be their dark or medieval period.

The problem is Africa, and the Americas, specifically North America. I am still undecided how to handle the Industrial and WW1 era for the Mississippians or North West Coast Indians.

Anyways, if you have any suggestions for the civs listed for the ancient period, please post the civ and leader's name and picture. And if possible a link to their wikipedia page or a short bio.

Egypt: Narmer, Ramesses II, Cleopatra
North Africa: Libyan, Dido (Carthage), Hannibal (Carthage)
Horn of Africa: Parahu (Punt), Makeda (Sheba), Wʿrn Ḥyw (D'mt)
Korea: Dangun Wanggeom (GoJoseon), Unknown (Three Kingdom Korea), Seondeok (Shilla)
Japan: Himiko (Yamatai-koku), Jimmu (Yamato), Yamato no Takeru (Yamato)

About the eras:
1) You can change the name of the eras to the "main civ".
Let say your first era starts in 2000 BC, and second era in 800 BC.
If you play as Europe, second era could be named "Iron age", and for Japan it could be "Bronze age".

Of you can use even more specific name. Like for China, the name of the eras are "Zhou dinasty", "Qin dynasty", etc...

This way, the game doesn't look to eurocentric.

2) As you can limit buildings or units to some era, it's easy to create "dark ages", by using less interesting buildings or units for some civ in some eras.

3) You can easily introduce many civ specific techs, so it can allows the requirements for such specific buildings. And with the concept of "heritage", you can decide that your civ can forget some knowledge

4) You can change the traits of a civ with each era. This can be helpful to create dark ages.

5) You can give a free tech to a civ when it discovers a new era. This is also very useful, for instance to force some buildings to become obsolete, or if you want to replace a civ with another.
Example: when entering the Merovingian era for France, a new tech is introduce, and it gives at once all the Frankish units to the French player, and as the Gaul units upgrade to it, it means when the Franks invade, all Gaul units are not available and can be upgraded immediately to the Frankish ones.

Oh, I also have a suggestion/request for you.

With my system, you could have civ specific advisor: if you play as France, the foreign advisor and have different graphics from the Japanese advisor, and this for each era.

When you make your leaderheads, could you try to make some variation of it to use as advisors?

I just need static images, so I hope it's not too difficult, and perhaps with only a few changes (like a new hat or cloth) you can easily make a "trader" "diplomat" or "general" version.

Steph said:

Oh, I also have a suggestion/request for you.

With my system, you could have civ specific advisor: if you play as France, the foreign advisor and have different graphics from the Japanese advisor, and this for each era.

When you make your leaderheads, could you try to make some variation of it to use as advisors?

I just need static images, so I hope it's not too difficult, and perhaps with only a few changes (like a new hat or cloth) you can easily make a "trader" "diplomat" or "general" version.

Click to expand...

That might be hard. Would culture specific be ok? Mediterranean, Northern European, North African, Black African, Middle Eastern, Indian, SE Asian, East Asian, Steppes, North American, Meso American.

What I don't like is having a king with a european medieval helmet with playing as Japan!

So as long as a graphic can be acceptable for a civ/era, it's OK.

I will try to go through the existing leaderheads database to find some suitable advisors to start with.

I made some Victorian Era Advisors, and they weren't hard at all to do. I first opened an appropriate leaderhead flc in irfanview and made copies of the first, middle and last frames (sometimes choosing frames in between, but you get the idea). These I opened in GIMP and removed the background. The results were resized and pasted onto the appropriate pcx in the Art/Smallheads folder. That's it.

I imagine a leaderhead maker could have some fun choosing original expressions for advisors...

Greece- B- Minos or Agamemnon? I- Lycurgus? C- Pericles or Alexander
China- B- Cheng Teng (sp?) I- Zhao of Zhou? QSH? C- QSH or Wu Di
India- B- Vatavelli? (the name of CivArmy's Harappan LH) I- Bimbisara? C- Ashoka
Anatolia- B- Hattusili I? I- Suppiluliuma I? C- Croesus?
Mesopotamia- B- Sargon I- Ashurbanipal C- ?
Mexico- B- Harvest Mountain Lord (an Olmec king) I- Spearthrower Owl? C- Ce Acatl Topiltzin?
Maya- B- ? I- Yikin Chan Kawiil or Pakal C- Siyaj Kak?

B=Bronze Age
I=Iron Age
C=Classical Age

Some suggestions

India

May I suggest thinking in terms of eras rather than specific rulers? Different people will want to use the LHs for different rulers depending on the period their scenario is set in & how prominent the Indian cultures are. If it's really necessary I can supply names for all except the Indus culture.

Indus Culture (Harappa): No translated names, no one knows if they even had heads of state, let alone kings. The best we've got is a bust:
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Classical Era Hindu rulers. This would include, for example, Ashoka. A LH with a multi-tiered helmet including a vertical circlet at the rear would be great. The sacred thread is another important part of the costume.
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Sometimes the ruler came from the Brahmin (intellectual) class rather than the Kshatriyas (martial). A LH with the Brahmin topknot could be for an era between the Indus & Classical, or from a Buddhist kingdom, or from a nation with a more regional flavor such as Nepal on the slopes of the Himalayas, or the Chola dynasty on the Southwest coast.
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Last is what might be called the Sultanate era. A LH could be used for any of the Mughals or their opponents such as the Sikhs or Marathans. This style of dress persisted into the era of the British Raj so it would still be suitable for an early industrial era LH.
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For China:
Bronze Age: Cheng Tang (Shang Dynasty)
Iron Age: King Wen (Zhou Dynasty)
Classical Age: Qin Shi Huang (Qin Dynasty) -or- Han Wudi (Han Dynasty)

For Korea:
Bronze Age: Dan'gun Wanggeom (Gojoseon)
Iron Age: Naemul Maripgan (Silla) -or- Queen Seondeok (Silla)
Classical Age: King Munmu (Dae Silla)

Mongolia is pretty tricky since there wasn't a more unified "Mongol" people until Genghis Khan Temujin. You chould mix the various northern steppes people together, but that can end up being pretty odd.

Mongolia would probably be Chunwei, Xiongnu, Xianbei.

@ Ogedei do you have any pictures of those Korean leaders.

maybe unified Shilla should be dark age because it would better fit the time period, so then I would push Seondeok and shilla for classical but this would leave a space, that maybe I can fill with the proto-three kingdom period. Any idea what I could use for that.

If you're using Queen Seondeok for the Classical Period and need a much earlier leader for the Iron Age, then either Bak Hyeokgeose or Naemul Maripgan would work. Bak Hyeokgeose is the legendary founder of Silla and Naemul Maripgan is the first ruler to have been clearly mentioned in extant Chinese sources. There are no surviving portraits of any rulers from the early periods, so it's entirely up to your imagination here. Both would have the golden forked antler style of crowns that Silla is known for.

If you don't want to use only Silla to represent Korea during this period, however, there's also Onjo of Baekje or Gwanggaeto of Goguryeo.

EDIT: Error on my part. Actually it was Jinheung that was said to have consolidated Silla, not Naemul. Naemul is the first ruler, however, to hae the interesting Silla title of "Maripgan."

Maya

1. Preclassic- The earliest Maya site we've found is San Bartolo. And there aren't any leader names there. But, there are many murals, and they show what some archaeologists think are the creation myth from the Popol Vuh. So you can use the name of the hero of that story, Hunahpu, for that LH name. Here's a picture of the mural that you could base his appearance on: (warning: is somewhat graphic)


2. Classic- The most important Classic site was Tikal (Mutal), and Tikal/Mutal's most important ruler was Yik'in Chan K'awiil, conqueror of Tikal/Mutal's nemesis, Calakmul/Kaan.
Here is a picture for you to base it on:

3. Postclassic- For the postclassic period, the LH should be Hunac Ceel, conqueror of Chichen Itza and founder of the Cocom dynasty of Mayapan that would rule the Yucatan for 200 years. Unfortunately, I couldn't find a picture.

Am am unsure if I should combine the Maya and the Aztec into one civ, because it looks like it will hard to have leaders and units for every era.

For my mod, the eras are Bronze, Iron, Classical, Dark Age, Medieval, High Medieval, and then I am unsure, I suppose Renaissance, Enlightenment, Industrial, WW1, WW2, Cold War, Modern.

the traditional Aztec, civs would be in the Medieval eras, I suppose I could put Olmec for Bronze, Toltec for Dark Age, but I do not know what to do for Iron and Classical. There I could put the Maya, but I don't really want to have the Aztecs alone in Meso America, because I use a world map. One the other hand, if the Aztecs become Mexico in the later eras, I don't really know what to do with the Maya. A similar dilemma is there for the other Native American civs. Should the Mississipians become the Confederate States of America, and then what, another US civ? Or a fictional what if Native American country.

Maya -> Guatemala?

NW Indians -> Cascadia? (Civ focusing on Washington, Oregon)

Mississippians -> maybe the modern Creek, Cherokee, or Natchez Indian nations.

Here's another possible picture to make a LH off of:

This is from a Korean drama version of King Jinheung. There are no extant pictures of any Silla rulers so this could also work for making a Bak Hyeokgeose or Naemul Maripgan LH. Be aware, of course, that dramas typically exaggerate the appearance of costumes. The crown in this picture is waaay too exaggerated; there are lots of examples of authentic Silla crowns online.


This is Dan'gun Wanggeom. Again extant images of rulers before the Goryeo period either have been lost to history or haven't been found yet. The earliest portrayals of Dan'gun we have are from the Joseon Dynasty. Note the grass cloak. I'm assuming that it is perhaps a stylistic inspiration from Chinese depictions of the mythical sages to give a sense of ancientness (Shen Nong, for example, is often portrayed having a grass cloak). Dan'gun was supposedly a contemporary of the Chinese mythical sage rulers.

@ Ogedei, I think will try to do something like that crown, it reminds me a bit of the baekje crowns.
Of course something like these crowns or the one you posted are hard for me with my limited skill and props, but I will try to do something.
Do you know if crown styles were kingdom specific?I think Iron-age Korea will be proto-three kingdoms.

So for the Gojoseon head, is there anything from the Chinese depicting Koreans from the time? Or any Korean cave paintings?

Also, what is the hat thing he is wearing?

ShiroKobbure said:

Am am unsure if I should combine the Maya and the Aztec into one civ, because it looks like it will hard to have leaders and units for every era.

For my mod, the eras are Bronze, Iron, Classical, Dark Age, Medieval, High Medieval, and then I am unsure, I suppose Renaissance, Enlightenment, Industrial, WW1, WW2, Cold War, Modern.

the traditional Aztec, civs would be in the Medieval eras, I suppose I could put Olmec for Bronze, Toltec for Dark Age, but I do not know what to do for Iron and Classical. There I could put the Maya, but I don't really want to have the Aztecs alone in Meso America, because I use a world map. One the other hand, if the Aztecs become Mexico in the later eras, I don't really know what to do with the Maya. A similar dilemma is there for the other Native American civs. Should the Mississipians become the Confederate States of America, and then what, another US civ? Or a fictional what if Native American country.

Click to expand...

I understand if you need to combine the Aztec and Mayan civs because of the civ limit, but other than for that reason, I support keeping them separate; there are certainly plenty of units and leaders to justify two Mesoamerican civs, and I would be happy to join Huayna in helping you with those features.

One problem I often see with the Stone-Bronze-Iron (not exactly what you are using but hopefully you understand what I mean) model for eras is that this model is difficult to apply to many cultures, and this is especially the case with the new world civilizations. Interpreted strictly, this model becomes rather arbitrary; we know that Mesoamericans did not have Iron working technology, so we might be inclined to group the enitrety of Mesoamerican history into only a couple of eras. The reason this may not make a lot of sense is because we might find that a certain period of mesoamerican history to be roughly equivilent to the 'iron age' period in parts of the old world in nearly every way but for the posession of actual iron working technology. It is with this in mind that I am glad to see that you seem to be leaning away from such a strict interpretation. At the same time, I would caution against the opposite model, organising the eras strictly temporally rather than technologically; this would condemn certain civs to take longer, often much longer, to reach certain technologies than other civs. Having said all of this, here is my suggestion for Mesoamerican eras; I have tried to strike a balance between the two models I have mentioned:

Bronze Age: From the 'beginning' to ~Middle Preclassic Period (c. 400 BCE)
Iron Age: ~Late Preclassic Period (c. 400 BCE - c.200 CE)
Classical Age: Early Classic Period (c. 200 - 700 CE)
Dark Age: Late to Terminal Classic Period (c. 700 - 1000 CE)
Medieval Age: Early Postclassic Period (c. 1000 - 1200 CE)
High Medieval Age: Late Postclassic Period (c. 1200 - 1500s CE)

I can suggest what civs / leaders would be representative of each of the eras if you like that arrangement.

A few other things:

- I would agree with having the Mississippian civilization transform into the USA.
- What kind of assistance might you need with the Andean civilizations?
- I am very happy to see a few new north african leaderheads in production! They, and the rest of the leaderheads look excellent so far, and I am excited about this project. I would not mind assisting with your work on your north african civilization if there is anything else you need to know.
- This seems to be some sort of a collaboration between you and Steph (is that correct?) so if any part of my above post addresses things that is more Steph's concern than yours, please consider those parts of my posts as actually addressing Steph (I am unsure exactly how the two of you have divided the responsibilities of this undertaking).

ShiroKobbure said:

@ Ogedei, I think will try to do something like that crown, it reminds me a bit of the baekje crowns.
Of course something like these crowns or the one you posted are hard for me with my limited skill and props, but I will try to do something.
Do you know if crown styles were kingdom specific?I think Iron-age Korea will be proto-three kingdoms.

So for the Gojoseon head, is there anything from the Chinese depicting Koreans from the time? Or any Korean cave paintings?

Also, what is the hat thing he is wearing?

Click to expand...

Regarding crowns, crowns of the Gaya confederacy tend to be much simpler compared to the ones made in Silla:


There was definitely an exchange of culture between Silla and Gaya, so if you don't want to use the overly complex antler decorations of the Silla crowns, it's not much of a stretch to substitute with the Gaya crowns.

Baekje crowns tended to be on the fancy side:


Unfortunately, we don't have any extant pictures of Koreans prior to the Three Kingdoms Period; there are the Goguryeo tomb murals, but those are specific to Goguryeo culture. Look up the "Goguryeo tomb murals" on Google search.

By the way, I think the hat thing Dan'gun is wearing may be a fur cap of some sort.

@ Red Alert.
The era naming is just a formality, instead of having era 1 2 3.
One other problem is I do not think there is many technologies for American civilizations to research, at least not when compared to the Old World. And then there is a problem of unit advancement. Although I have nearly finished my Olmec, Toltec, Aztec, Preclassical and Classical Maya units.

As for North Africa, I need help with the Mali region, although its not really North Africa. I do not believe they had writing until Islam. But maybe other North African civilizations had contact with the area in ancient times and wrote about it.

I am not collaborating with Steph's mod. I am really just making leaderheads for my personal mod and that I hope other people will find a use for.



@Ogedei, I will check out those gojoseon tombs