Alexander's Conquests development thread

[Ozymandias]

I think you enjoy this more than you let on.

What gave it away?

 

[Blue Monkey]

I apologize if you've already seen this; I've had the link so long I've forgotten where I stumbled across it. I thought it might be of help in placing some of the civs/tribes.
Interactive Herodotus Map

 

[Blue Monkey]

EDIT: DELETE. ...oops, my first double post. The whole site was flaky yesterday.

 

[Keroro]

Tech trees are updated on post five. Some (most) of the buildings and units have ended up in the wrong place, so ignore them for the moment. Otherwise, comments are welcome.

@ Blue_Monkey - interesting new avatar. It's soooo difficult trying to get all the different ancient maps and modern maps together and work out where to put cities - so - I put them wherever they fit. I took a look at the map you linked, and I think it should be pretty useful as far as the barb. civs go, thanks. At least I have some barb names now that aren't in latin.

@ Oz - wherever people need historical advice - there you are - giving it.

@ Virote_Considon - Most of the historical sources agree that the Thessalians were just about as good as the Companions, they just weren't thrown forward in reckless (battle winning) charges. I'm thinking about giving companions the stealth attack ability to represent their uncanny ability to get to the most important part of the battle and make a difference.

 

[Virote_Considon]

@ Virote_Considon - Most of the historical sources agree that the Thessalians were just about as good as the Companions, they just weren't thrown forward in reckless (battle winning) charges. I'm thinking about giving companions the stealth attack ability to represent their uncanny ability to get to the most important part of the battle and make a difference.

When I said High/Med/Low, I didn't mean a HUGE difference, more like:
4/2/3 compared to 3/3/3, depending where they fit, of course.

 

[Keroro]

When I said High/Med/Low, I didn't mean a HUGE difference, more like:
4/2/3 compared to 3/3/3, depending where they fit, of course.

Unit stats are still to be decided, though I think that the main reason the Thessalians have a defensive character in most of Alex's battles is because he kept them back for fear of showing up the Companions.

In other news... Does anyone know what files I need to change to alter the appearance of the advisors that pop up in the top right corner in the game? And has anyone done a set of ancient advisors that look better than the Firaxis ones?

 

[pinktilapia]

Go in the folder art\smallHeads; there you will find each advisor pcx which name starts with "popup..."

R8XFT did at least a few, there may (must!) be others.

 

[Ozymandias]

I recently stumbled across an old carboard-and-paper magazine game called "Alexandros: Conquest and Empire". It has some interesting victory possibilities. I'm not really sure how "Capture The Princess" mode works with multiple "Princesses", but possible targets could be the famous Roxane (they have her located at the Sogdian Rock); the Persian Royal Family (they historically travelled with Darius, but might be placed elsewhere, like Perseplis); Gordia (representing his cutting the famous Knot); The Temple (Oracle) of Ammon - and various treasure units (they reckon the bottom line for wealth, as measured in talents, as 20,000 for Babylon, 59,000 for Susa, 12,000 for Ecbatana, and ten times that - obviously 120,000 - for Persepolis).

Anyway, just some nearly random thoughts.

Best,

Oz

PS - Keroro, did you get my email?

-O

 

[Keroro]

Go in the folder art\smallHeads; there you will find each advisor pcx which name starts with "popup..."

R8XFT did at least a few, there may (must!) be others.

Thanks Pink, I got a few advisors from R8FXT, one from RFRE, and then converted the military one from a LH. How do these look?

Haven't tried them in game yet, and I'm a bit worried that the military guy's shield is going to look odd.

 

[Keroro]

I recently stumbled across an old carboard-and-paper magazine game called "Alexandros: Conquest and Empire". It has some interesting victory possibilities. I'm not really sure how "Capture The Princess" mode works with multiple "Princesses", but possible targets could be the famous Roxane (they have her located at the Sogdian Rock); the Persian Royal Family (they historically travelled with Darius, but might be placed elsewhere, like Perseplis); Gordia (representing his cutting the famous Knot); The Temple (Oracle) of Ammon - and various treasure units (they reckon the bottom line for wealth, as measured in talents, as 20,000 for Babylon, 59,000 for Susa, 12,000 for Ecbatana, and ten times that - obviously 120,000 - for Persepolis).

Anyway, just some nearly random thoughts.

Best,

Oz

PS - Keroro, did you get my email?

-O

I've got three princesses in the game so far that can be upgraded to heirs. The heirs open up one possible victory method. Most of the other things that you've mentioned are in the game too, the Gordian Knot and the Oracle in Siwa are Wonders that only work under the Macedonian government.

The thing that strikes me is that I need to somehow represent the booty that Alex collected as he conquered the Persians. I'm already using a flag unit to represent Alex's Sarcophagus, but does anyone know if there is a way to get two different flag units into the game - one to give you money, one to give you VPs?

 

[Virote_Considon]

Unfortunatley, not. Otherwise, Argos etc. would be "In the Money". ATM, all they can do is capture the Golden Fleece and ship it off to Troy.

 

[Ozymandias]

The thing that strikes me is that I need to somehow represent the booty that Alex collected as he conquered the Persians.

Perhaps a surprisingly easy fix: I've given you the location and amount of wealth of each of the four Persian treasuries. Make four diffferent "invisible" resources (i.e., resource with no graphic). Put one in each city and have each generate an appropriate number of shields per turn. It'll undoubtedly take some tweaking to get it right (of course recalling that the Persians will start with all 4) but that's just part of the joy of modding.

Best,

Oz

 

[Keroro]

Perhaps a surprisingly easy fix: I've given you the location and amount of wealth of each of the four Persian treasuries. Make four diffferent "invisible" resources (i.e., resource with no graphic). Put one in each city and have each generate an appropriate number of shields per turn. It'll undoubtedly take some tweaking to get it right (of course recalling that the Persians will start with all 4) but that's just part of the joy of modding.

That's not a bad idea, and I could have the resource so that it required the Alexandrian Heritage advance to see it, then the Persians would get no benefit from it. The other thing I could test is an improvement that is effectively useless, but can be sold off for a large amount of Gold and shields. The Palace of Persepolis is already represented in this way (with a large upkeep cost to force Alex to destroy it), maybe I could put some other treasure hordes in too.

And talking of testing (seamless segue there ) if anyone is wanting to playtest then please send me a PM or post here.

 

[Ozymandias]

That's not a bad idea, and I could have the resource so that it required the Alexandrian Heritage advance to see it, then the Persians would get no benefit from it. The other thing I could test is an improvement that is effectively useless, but can be sold off for a large amount of Gold and shields. The Palace of Persepolis is already represented in this way (with a large upkeep cost to force Alex to destroy it), maybe I could put some other treasure hordes in too.

And talking of testing (seamless segue there ) if anyone is wanting to playtest then please send me a PM or post here.

(1) Good ideas and (2) sadly, a deadly schedule & deadline keeps me tied up for the next three months or so, followed by a nice stay (if I can find such a place) with both "umbrella drinks" and padded walls ...

Best,

Oz

 

[Virote_Considon]

I wouldn't mind playtesting after EFZI2's released.

 

[Keroro]

Quick update - have tried to work quite a bit on the civpedia in the last week or so. Now have a brief description on most of the units and buildings, and have some 'orientation' entries to help people understand what they have to do to get their conquests going. Other than that and some debugging there's not much to say for now.

Quick historical question - Camels? I can't seem to find any idea of which peoples tended to use camel mounted warriors in their armies. My gut feeling is to give them to Arabia, Egypt and possibly Cyrenaica. Any ideas?

Oh, and thanks for considering the playtesting V_C and Oz.

 

[Blue Monkey]

Camels - all across central Asia - there's probably a reason one species of camel is called Bactrian

 

[Ozymandias]

@ Blue Monkey - Bactrian camels - camelus bactrianus - actually originated in the Gobi; they're called "Bactrian" simply because Bactria (Afghanistan) is where homo sapiens first encountered them in historical times ...

... and @Keroro - I only learned that while performing a mildly exhaustive search on your question on their (and presumably also c. dromedarius') use in war. Sadly, I couldn't find anything useful. Yes, they were used by both Alex's and the Persian armies, but, reading between the lines, I suspect only as pack animals. Likewise no reference to anyone else (be they Arabian, Egyptian, Cyrenaican or otherwise) as war mounts at that time.

... Hmmm ... this might be a question better put to Plotinus ...

Best,

Oz

 

[Blue Monkey]

@ Blue Monkey - Bactrian camels - camelus bactrianus - actually originated in the Gobi; they're called "Bactrian" simply because Bactria (Afghanistan) is where homo sapiens first encountered them in historical times ...

Since we're being picky, maybe we ought to stipulate that they're called Bactrian because the Greeks first encountered them in what they called Bactria. They were domesticated for about 2 millenia prior to Alexander The G; that includes quite a swathe of history-making by many non-hellene sapiens.

 

[Keroro]

I've got Bactrian camels in as a seperate resource from the egyptian/arabian camels.
@ Blue - I take your point about the Bactrians only being called such because it was where Greeks first saw them, but this scenario (as you have probably noticed) is unashamedly hellene-centric.
@ Oz - There really doesn't seem to be much evidence of them being used at all in war around the fourth century BCE. I just don't want to leave them out completely since they have such character.

ATM it looks like the camels and Dromedaries will have to be required for certain buildings rather than for units. Any ideas on how to represent a baggage train. Ooh, Ive got one, a land transport that allows wheeled units to move through dense terrain. Any other ideas? What are camels good for?

The only reference I've been able to find to camels used in wars is on CFC, in this thread, post 235/6.