Anno Domini Classic: discussion thread part 3 (warning: lots of images on page one)

[Rob (R8XFT)]

New leaderheads

I've updated a few leaderheads and even made a new one . First of all, Alfred the Great has been installed as leader of the Anglo-Saxons:

Next up, there's been an update to Ramesses II:

The Scots need a leader. How about my new version of Malcolm II:

Alexander has become the new leader of the Macedonians:

Finally, here's a change to Kanishka's clothing - just a texture alteration. Any thoughts before I render this?

 

[Yoda Power]

Didn't you already use Kaniskhas clothes texture in another head?

 

[Plotinus]

Alexander is fantastic! He has the advantage of actually looking like Alexander too.

 

[Rob (R8XFT)]

Didn't you already use Kaniskhas clothes texture in another head?

Actually, it seems I used the same texture in the Nausharo II turban:

Does that really matter though?

@Plotinus: thanks for your comments. He's actually an update of Verica; I thought that the Verica leaderhead, with some amendments, would look quite similar to Alexander and I'm very pleased that you think so too.

 

[Keroro]

Alfred seems to have a slightly too dark background - he gets a bit lost. I like Malcolm, though his beard seems to be a bit badly defined. It may look better when you see it move. All good LHs Rob.

And Alexander, well, very good. I always liked the look of Verica, and this LH does, as Plotinus says, actually look like Alexander. With both you and Shirou making an Alexander I'll be spoilt for choice. Which is good.

 

[Mirc]

These LHs look great!! Especially Alexander and the new Kanishka.

 

[flamescreen]

This looks like it'll be an excellent mod.
Might be biased, but I think that Alexander leaderhead is the best you've made till now, even if it's just an upgrade of Verica.

Btw, it's a bit late for that, but about the sarissoforoi debate, you could go with prodromoi for the cavalry and as a middle solution for the phalanx, a sarissa phalanx wouldn't be inaccurate - however I'm sure they called it just phalanx back then(or Macedonian phalanx if you weren't Macedonian), like we call various kind of tanks, tanks today(and rarely use their specific names, e.g. you say Americans used 50 tanks in that battle you don't actually say 50 Abrams').

Sarissa spear is the defining element that makes it clear they're not the standard phalanx and probably would be nice to be included in the name somehow(like you make the distinction today on bullets/ammo mm). Though the decision is prolly made on the name this late.

What's that suit you're using on Alexander? One of the Freak ones?

 

[Rob (R8XFT)]

@Keroro: I promise you that both the Malcolm and Alfred the Great leaderheads look fine in-game.

@flamescreen: Names of units can be easily changed. The reason I went with "Macedonian phalanx" instead of just "phalanx" is that some of the other civs also have phalanxes (okay, so that's probably not the plural ), so I needed a way of defining which was which. Using their nationality or geographical grouping seemed to be the best idea to me (e.g. I have "European Tool Age Spearman" which is a flavour of the "Tool Age Spearman" and similar to the "Egyptian Tool Age Spearman").

In other news, I thought some time ago about government types and was thinking of not actually having governments per se, but religions. Each religion would be a "government" - and you could make it, for example, that civilizations able to adopt Christianity would not be very favourable to civs adopting Islam. This way, the conversion rate of citizens, the war weariness and the diplomats/spies strengths would be directly connected to their religion, as would their productivity.

Any thoughts?

 

[embryodead]

I had religion-governments in early MEM (and it works like that in WH, though not called religions), and I can tell you the diplomatic relations and other features are hardly noticeable. For diplomacy it's only -5 on a 141 point scale if you have opposing governments set and +1 if they're the same. The good thing about it is the easiness of adding religion-specific buildings, and the bad is lack of government changing (or if you make them changeable, you'll have a hard time stopping the AI from choosing "the best one" unless all of them have no big differences).

Thumbs up on the LHs, especially the real-looking Alexander!

 

[Virote_Considon]

In other news, I thought some time ago about government types and was thinking of not actually having governments per se, but religions. Each religion would be a "government" - and you could make it, for example, that civilizations able to adopt Christianity would not be very favourable to civs adopting Islam. This way, the conversion rate of citizens, the war weariness and the diplomats/spies strengths would be directly connected to their religion, as would their productivity.

Any thoughts?

I dislike this idea, myself.

Speaking of Islam, I've noticed that there are no Middle-Ages Mid-Eastern civs. Who would there be to favour an Islamic government?

 

[Quinzy]

Phalangite is the singular, phalanx the plural.
There I go again...

 

[Yoda Power]

Actually, it seems I used the same texture in the Nausharo II turban:

Does that really matter though?

To me it does.

 

[Blue Monkey]

I actually liked this one much better.

More contrast with the background and makes his face "read" better. I think it's more in keeping with the Tokharian* roots of the Kushans, and it's also quite distinctive from the clothing of the other LHs. If it's not too late you may also consider lightening his hair and beard a little. Could you make it reddish (not bright Irish red) with paler eyes (maybe hazel?) while keeping the skin swarthy to represent the mixed heritage Kushans would have had at this point in time?


*

Spoiler :

To quote the notorious Wikipedia:

There is evidence both from the mummies and Chinese writings that many of them had blonde or red hair and blue eyes, characteristics also found in present-day Afghanistan, Pakistan, Tajikistan and Central Asia, ... This suggests the possibility that they were part of an early migration of speakers of Indo-European languages


... According to a controversial theory, early invasions by Turkic speakers may have pushed Tocharian speakers out of the Tarim Basin and into modern Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Pakistan and northern India in the form of Kushans and the Tocharo-Iranic Hephthalites.

... Textile analysis has shown some similarities to the Iron Age civilizations of Europe dating from 800BC, including woven twill and tartan patterns strikingly similar to Celtic tartans from Northwest Europe.

... The Tocharians appear to have originally spoken two distinct languages of the Indo-European Tocharian family, an Eastern ("A") form and a Western ("B") form. According to some, only the Eastern ("A") form can be properly called "Tocharian", as the native name for the Western form is referred to as Kuchean ...

... They might be the same as, or were related to, the Indo-European Yuezhi who fled from their settlements in Gansu under attacks from the Xiongnu in the 2nd century BC (Shiji Chinese historical Chronicles, Chap. 123) and expanded south to Bactria and northern India to form the Kushan Empire.
... Strabo presented them as a Scythian tribe, ... These Tochari are identified with the Yuezhi and one of their major tribes, the Kushans. The geographical term Tokharistan usually refers to 1st millennium Bactria...

... Based on a Turkic reference to Tocharian A as twqry, these languages were associated with the Kushan ruling class, but the exact relation of the speakers of these languages and the Kushan Tokharoi is uncertain, ...
... The native name of the historical Tocharians of the 6th to 8th centuries was, according to J. P. Mallory, possibly kuśiññe "Kuchean" (Tocharian B), "of the kingdom of Kucha and Agni"...

... Sanskrit literature in numerous instances refers to the Tocharians as Tusharas, Tukharas, Tokharas and Tuharas etc. ... the Tusharas probably were ... in Transoxian region. ... The Kushanas or Kanishkas are also the same people.

 

[Rob (R8XFT)]

Thanks for the info, Blue Monkey. I hope that the new version of Kanishka is in line with what you were wanting:

 

[Blue Monkey]

That's awesome! He looks like an Afghani, which is perfect.

 

[Rob (R8XFT)]

That's awesome! He looks like an Afghani, which is perfect.

I aim to please ; glad you like it!

In the final civ line-up, I decided to drop Iona in favour of the Franks; here's Charlemagne:

Iona was going to have some early pollution-busting buildings; perhaps I could give this to Maurya now?

Whilst I'd got that hair/beard prop available (i.e. the one I used for Charlemagne), I decided to update the Alfred the Great leaderhead:

I now have a bit of a pcx backlog, which I'll clear up whilst the other PCs render units. A friend was throwing out an old PC, so I couldn't resist. Whilst it's not really able to run Poser fast, it's not a bad PC and I can do all my pcxs on that whilst I have one PC doing generic Greek units and the other doing generic Indian units.

 

[Partizanac]

I love Big Bearded Kings, WE NEED MORE!!

Rob you're the MAN!!

 

[Stormrage]

Great LHs, thank you!

What do you mean by generic Indian units? Did I miss something? Are there previews somewhere?

 

[Rob (R8XFT)]

Great LHs, thank you!

What do you mean by generic Indian units? Did I miss something? Are there previews somewhere?

There aren't any previews yet because I've not done any yet! There's three Indian civs in the mix, the Harappans, Kushan and Maurya - so they'll need some units doing, as units specific to that culture are few and far between.

I'm glad you like the leaderheads .

 

[embryodead]

I admit I ignored the original Alfred (particularly dear to me since I wanted one as the most "English" king) because I didn't like him But the new one is really great, the beard, clothing and background made a real difference Charlemagne is also very good.