Byzantine, Carthaginian, and Vietnamese Units

[Bakuel]

I just wanted to announce that I have uploaded some new units,

First the Byzantine units,

Byzantine Ancient Age Unit Pack,

http://forums.civfanatics.com/downloads.php?do=file&id=12913


Byzantine Middle Age Unit Pack,

http://forums.civfanatics.com/downloads.php?do=file&id=12915


Some Carthaginian units,

Carthaginian Ancient Age Unit Pack,

http://forums.civfanatics.com/downloads.php?do=file&id=12916


Carthaginian Middle Age Unit Pack,

http://forums.civfanatics.com/downloads.php?do=file&id=12918


And finally some Vietnamese units,

Vietnamese Ancient Age Unit Pack,

http://forums.civfanatics.com/downloads.php?do=file&id=12919


Vietnamese Middle Age Unit Pack,

http://forums.civfanatics.com/downloads.php?do=file&id=12920


Trung Sisters,

http://forums.civfanatics.com/downloads.php?do=file&id=12921


And that's that.
Tell me if their is anything wrong with the download and feel free to comment and state what you like, hate, or what you would do differently and so on.

 

[Agent327]

Looking pretty good!

 

[Bakuel]

Thanks JEELEN!

 

[mjd]

They look great. Thanks!

 

[avain]

Thank you so much Bakuel, this is another amazing pack!
The Byzantine and Carthage really needed this revamp, it's just the icing on the cake that we received these little marvels.
And now I have to think on making a Viatnemese civ sometime in the future along with the Nubians and Israel...
So many quality civs, my heart bleeds that Civ4 can handle only so much before giving MAFs...

 

[stmartin]

What are those Trung sisters?

 

[avain]

What are those Trung sisters?

You can check that at the download page, but I'll copy it here for you

The Trung Sisters where two sisters, Trung Trac and Trung Nhi, who led a rebellion against the Chinese in Vietnam around the first century AD. Even though their rebellion and rule was short lived, the Sisters became famous and can be thought of as national heroines of Vietnam.

 

[cybrxkhan]

The Trung Sisters were personally requested by me for WoL. They basically are the greatest national heroes for us Vietnamese. And in case anyone was wondering, here's the picture that Bakuel based the Trung sisters on:

Excellent work, Bakuel! The Ancient Vietnamese look Polynesian for some reason, but that's actually good in a way - Vietnamese are technically more closely related to the Austronesian peoples than the Chinese, and our ancient culture was more like that of South East Asia rather than that of China, so it makes sense. And the Trung sisters look very excellent - not too spiffy and elaborate like in the picture, but a bit more plain, probably more like what they would have been like.

Anyhow, I think I'll be replacing some of the default game UU art with your art (like the Cataphract, I like this one much much better), because frankly these look much better than some of the default game UU art.

By the way, will there be renaissance units for these guys?

 

[The Capo]

Awesome work Bakuel, fantastic job! As always.

 

[achilleszero]

Awesome units, Bakuel. You seem to have this nack for making whatever units that I need the most at any particular moment.

 

[The_J]

Great work .

You can check that at the download page, but I'll copy it here for you

The Trung Sisters where two sisters, Trung Trac and Trung Nhi, who led a rebellion against the Chinese in Vietnam around the first century AD. Even though their rebellion and rule was short lived, the Sisters became famous and can be thought of as national heroines of Vietnam.

I guess this was a joke .

 

[cybrxkhan]

^What do you mean by joke? We Vietnamese practically consider these sisters the embodiment of Vietnamese culture, the dangerously creepy strength of our women, and our fervent belief in our non-Chinese-ness.

 

[The_J]

No, i meant, that stmartin has made a joke.
A guy, who's made a mod about ancient china, sure will now about these persons .

 

[Bakuel]

Thank for the kind words everyone!!

I'm glad you like the Vietnam units cybrxkhan! Especially the ancient units! I had to base some off of the general culture of Southeast asia and bits of Oceania, because I had no idea how to interpret some of those dong sun artifacts but I presumed that ancient Viet was closer culturally to this region then with ancient China. For instance, the shirt-lion cloth combo on the spearman may seem vaguely Khmerish from the walls of Angkor Wat. However, the bronze amulets, bronze plate "armor"(Some interpreted the bronze plate in the attachment as armor, I personally am still a bit skeptical), and leg bracelet type-thingys are based off of actual artifacts (expect not as extravagant) as well as the shape of the axes, and the feather headdresses.

As for the description of the Trung Sisters, I really wasn't joking, even though I am a outsider, it seems that while their are better rulers of Vietnam and much better generals, none seem as odd (and thus memorable) as the legendary Trung Sisters. I mean, I read a legend that most of the army was made up of angry women! How many times in the history of the ancient world is a great imperial power like China repelled by angry women? (I mean angry women are scary, but a army of them?! The Chinese army didn't stand a chance.) While this may or may not be true, it is easy to imagine why the Trung sisters became legends and then national heroines.

I am also happy you like the cataphract! While the people at Firaxis can create much higher quality units, I have always wondered at their design choices. For instance, weird golden armor cataphracts? When the historical armor is already awesome, it really leaves no reason to go down the unhistorical route.

@avain
I was actually supposed to post these units before you updated VD, but they kept getting delayed. I think you where the one who gave me the idea to do Carthaginian and Byzantine units.

EDIT: Oh I understand what you mean now, The_J, I thought that you meant my description was a joke.

EDIT: Opps! cybrxkhan, I realized that I for got to answer your question about the Vietnam renaissance units. I could make a musketman and a cuirassier for Vietnam, but I have no idea what they would look like so if you have anything specific in mind feel free to tell me. Researching for Vietnam armies is hard.

 

[achilleszero]

I mean, I read a legend that most of the army was made up of angry women! How many times in the history of the ancient world is a great imperial power like China repelled by angry women? (I mean angry women are scary, but a army of them?! The Chinese army didn't stand a chance.)

classic!

Ok question time. In your new greek unit threads I think I asked about the sacred band of thebes. So this time I want to ask you about the Sacred Band of Carthage. Any material you came across desribe or depict them. Or were they just like the greeks and pretty much wore whatever. Worst case I can use Danrell's old Carthage set as a base for making one, as they look more "formal"

 

[Bakuel]

The only real 100% historical tad bit about the band that I really know is that they painted their shields white and they were the richer parts of Carthaginian society. My sacred band based off of the sacred band from the Rome Total Realism mod in the attachment, expect I gave them a fancy traveling cloak to keep the dust off of their armor.
Even though the band was probably equipped with good weapons and armor, they probably didn't have a set uniform so some would probably be equipped with linothorax, some chainmail, and some probably the fancy bronze muscled chest armor .etc. The only uniform that I really know of is the white shield, so as long as the unit has that and some good quality armor and weapons you could probably use it for the sacred band.

Of course, you should note that I am not the foremost expert on Carthaginian armies, most of this is what I had to read up on as I was making the units and doing research.

 

[achilleszero]

Yeah every time I try to do some research on a unit I get inundated with pictures from Rome total war. Even worse is try to research spartans as you have to sift through pictures from halo 3!

 

[Walter Hawkwood]

The coolness embodied, as usual.

I admit, not much of it will go into TR, but that's mostly because we already had most Byzantine and Carthagian units we needed, and we have no Vietnam. But that in no way detracts from the usual brilliant quality and realism of the units. I also have to admit that I never heard of white shields without a charge for Sacred Band before; in other renditions, it is supplied with a charge, and the instance appearing in TR mod is a cavalry unit - not unlike the one featuring in RTR and other sources as well (although Wiki says they were all foot - I don't know which source to trust on that).

 

[Bakuel]

Thanks for the kind words Walter Hawkwood!
I was planning to make some sacred band cavalry and I was going to redo the Numidan Cavalry unit as well but I decided against it because these units kept getting delayed. I realized that if I kept tweaking these units they probably would never be released.

Slightly off-topic, but Byzantine is in Total Realism? For some odd reason, I always thought that you guys where planning to take out Byzantine (since Greek and Rome are already in the game) as well as the Holy Roman Empire and the native Americans, but then again, my memory could be messed up.

 

[Walter Hawkwood]

You are quite right, and Byzantine units are used for medieval Greece all the way. There is no reason to have a separate Byzantium.

BTW, here's our Sacred Band cavalry - it is a simple Prodromoi reskin, but still... Also present is Carthagian assault infantry, as per this link (BTW, if EB has Sacred Band Cavalry, I am well prepared to believe they existed); I understand this is one of more popular units from yours truly, I keep encountering it here and there included in mods.

And now for an obligatory question: what's next?