Call me completely crazy BUT: I think I nailed Celts as viable Civ

[Imperator Knoedel]

You don't know what contested means, do you.

 

[Big Heb]

You don't know what contested means, do you.

Historical in another civ's core, no?

 

[DC123456789]

Why not just have the Celts spawn with Vindobana ("Windobana"/"Vedunia") as a capital, if we're starting them there?

 

[Publicola]

So it seems like we have two competing proposals for the new Celtic civ.

The first would be to have them spawn at Halstatt/Vienna around 800 BC. Despite being the earliest start, this would involve the most aggressive expansion since the Celts would be acting in both western and eastern Europe. To prepare for second and third UHVs, the Celts would need to settling Gaul and northern Italy. To prepare for their first UHV, the Celts would need to be a genuine military competitor to at least Rome, possibly Greece as well (we might alter the UHV 1 to read: "control a city in both the Greek and Roman core in 200 BC"). They would need to be weak enough to fall beneath the Roman onslaught after 200 BC, though, and be driven bck to the Insular Celtic lands of Brittany, Ireland, and Scotland.

The second proposal would be to have the Celts spawn as La Tene, probably between 600 and 500 BC. Their capital could perhaps be Geneva (stone hill north of the Alps?) to reflect the La Tene site, or one of the cities in Gaul to reflect their later centers of power. Being a later start (and spawning further west), these Celts would not start at war with Greece or need to deal with the eastern expansion and migration. They'd still need to worry about controlling a city in the Roman core, and settling Gaul to prepare for a move to the British Isles.

Personally I favor the second proposal. However, this being someone else's mod, I figure it'd be best to have them adjudicate. Leoreth, which of these are you currently favoring? Which should we put more of our effort toward developing?

In hopes that Leoreth does favor the second one, I'm going to consolidate my current proposal here:

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Civilization: The Celts
Starting Leader: Brennus
Starting Date: circa 500 BC
Spawn Site: La Tene (Geneva), on the stone hill north of the Alps -- this city will auto-raze upon being captured or with the German spawn.

Unique Power: The Power of Ceilidh (+10% unit production per unimproved forest beside a city)
Unique Building: Dun (replaces Walls, gives extra culture and free Woodsman I promotion)
Unique Unit: Gallic Warrior (replaces Swordsman, ______) -- I've considered a few possible effects: giving the unit two movement, or perhaps a free "March" promotion (heals while moving), or just the default "Guerilla I" promotion. I'm still undecided. Thoughts?

UHV 1: control a city within the Roman core in 200 BC
UHV 2: have a capital and a city with refined culture in the British Isles by 1 AD
UHV 3: build Christian monasteries in your cities in Iceland, Ireland, Scotland, Wales, Cornwall, and Brittany by 600 AD.


Expansion Stability:

Core starts in Gaul/France -- all tiles west of the Rhine (including La Tene), though excluding the southernmost tiles in France that border the Mediterranean.​

Northern Italy, southern France, and northern Spain start as 'Historical' and becomes 'Contested' after Roman spawn. All other tiles in Italy and Spain start as 'Foreign'; Italy becomes 'Foreign Core' after Roman spawn.​

British Isles start as 'Historical' until...​

After the new palace is built (per UHV 2), the tile stability values would change to:

The new Celtic Core would center in Ireland and Scotland.​

Wales/Cornwall, Brittany, and Iceland would start 'Historical' and become 'Contested' after the English, French and Viking spawns respectively.​

The rest of Gaul and England proper would start as 'Contested', and become 'Foreign Core' after the French and English spawns.​

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...I think that just about covers everything. I'm still unsure of some of the specific dates, both for spawn and for the UHVs. Insubres (Mediolanum) was conquered by Rome "at the beginning of the 2nd century BC," so I wasn't sure if 200 BC or a slightly later date would be preferable. Likewise for the second UHV -- should it be based on when Celtic Gaul was conquered and Romanized, or until the Insular Celts in Britain became a significant regional presence.

As for the Unique Unit... given that the Celts don't really have a military rivalry with England or the Vikings until after their third UHV, I figured it'd be best to keep a UU that they could actually use. Still not sure about the specific effect or change, though.


I should also mention, that I think it'd be a good idea to double check the map of Ireland (and to a lesser extent Scotland), to ensure it will suffice for the core territory of a Celtic civilization. Ireland is currently so lacking that it's honestly rare to see a human playing as England who even bothers conquering Dublin, and just leaves it for the Vikings or as a permanent independent city right beside their core. I'd like to think we can make the city a bit more worthwhile than that. I'd like to have Ireland be able to support at least two cities, most likely Cork and either Dublin or Belfast.

 

[Visard]

Third UHV could be elegantly: Build Christian monasteries on four different landmasses by 600AD.

Also there should be additional sea food in Ireland that can be used only from Belfast.

 

[Tomorrow's Dawn]

So it seems like we have two competing proposals for the new Celtic civ.

The first would be to have them spawn at Halstatt/Vienna around 800 BC. Despite being the earliest start, this would involve the most aggressive expansion since the Celts would be acting in both western and eastern Europe. To prepare for second and third UHVs, the Celts would need to settling Gaul and northern Italy. To prepare for their first UHV, the Celts would need to be a genuine military competitor to at least Rome, possibly Greece as well (we might alter the UHV 1 to read: "control a city in both the Greek and Roman core in 200 BC"). They would need to be weak enough to fall beneath the Roman onslaught after 200 BC, though, and be driven bck to the Insular Celtic lands of Brittany, Ireland, and Scotland.

The second proposal would be to have the Celts spawn as La Tene, probably between 600 and 500 BC. Their capital could perhaps be Geneva (stone hill north of the Alps?) to reflect the La Tene site, or one of the cities in Gaul to reflect their later centers of power. Being a later start (and spawning further west), these Celts would not start at war with Greece or need to deal with the eastern expansion and migration. They'd still need to worry about controlling a city in the Roman core, and settling Gaul to prepare for a move to the British Isles.

I personally favor the first one simply because I'm in favor of having extra turns as a cushion against mistakes. I'm fully behind your design outline for the Celts (UU, UP, UHV, etc.) otherwise.

I should also mention, that I think it'd be a good idea to double check the map of Ireland (and to a lesser extent Scotland), to ensure it will suffice for the core territory of a Celtic civilization. Ireland is currently so lacking that it's honestly rare to see a human playing as England who even bothers conquering Dublin, and just leaves it for the Vikings or as a permanent independent city right beside their core. I'd like to think we can make the city a bit more worthwhile than that. I'd like to have Ireland be able to support at least two cities, most likely Cork and either Dublin or Belfast.

Ireland doesn't fare terribly when it comes to Food, but I should mention it's just not very productive.
It also certainly cannot support more than one city effectively.

 

[Leoreth]

For quite some time now Ireland is the easiest source of Horse available to England, though.

 

[Publicola]

Third UHV could be elegantly: Build Christian monasteries on four different landmasses by 600AD.

I like it! I do think the phrasing should also require more than four monasteries total, though. Perhaps this would work?

UHV 3: Build 6 [or 7?] Christian monasteries on four different landmasses by 600 AD​

Also there should be additional sea food in Ireland that can be used only from Belfast.

Ireland doesn't fare terribly when it comes to Food, but I should mention it's just not very productive. It also certainly cannot support more than one city effectively.

I agree with Tomorrow's Dawn that the major issue with Ireland is not the food situation, though extra sea food would certainly help to support a second city. The bigger issue is commerce and production, and making sure that Ireland would have the resources needed for health and happiness (or to trade for such resources).

I personally favor the first one simply because I'm in favor of having extra turns as a cushion against mistakes. I'm fully behind your design outline for the Celts (UU, UP, UHV, etc.) otherwise.

Thanks! I think I underestimated the amount of time needed to make sure the player can fulfill the first two UHVs. Can anyone tell me the actual number of turns that take place between 500 BC and 1 AD, or the breakdown for how many years are covered per turn in that timespan? It may be better to push the La Tene start back to 600 or earlier to give that 'cushion against mistakes,' though I'd still like to keep it a challenge.


Finally, does anyone have suggestions for how to customize the Celtic Unique Unit? At the moment I'm inclined to go with "March" (can heal while moving), both because it'd give the Celts a unique flavor in the Classical Era and because giving them a special advantage for mobility just seems to 'mesh' with the real history of the Celtic tribes.

 

[Panopticon]

Ireland doesn't need to be rich; it wasn't.

 

[Leoreth]

Ireland doesn't need to be rich; it wasn't.

Yeah, life should be hard for you once you're reduced to Ireland.

 

[Big Heb]

Why not just have the Celts spawn with Vindobana ("Windobana"/"Vedunia") as a capital, if we're starting them there?

That works too. I just think there should be more cities, particularly Celtic cities, built by the time the Romans go on their conquests. The Romans are well known as conquerors and administrators, not settlers. All of the major cities in Western Europe were first settled by the Celts or by the Carthaginians (in the case of southern Iberia).

 

[Tomorrow's Dawn]

Finally, does anyone have suggestions for how to customize the Celtic Unique Unit? At the moment I'm inclined to go with "March" (can heal while moving), both because it'd give the Celts a unique flavor in the Classical Era and because giving them a special advantage for mobility just seems to 'mesh' with the real history of the Celtic tribes.

Woodsman II to further incentivize protecting Forests and to prevent them from being OP city defenders for Human Rome as would be the case if they had the Guerrilla line.

 

[Publicola]

Yeah, life should be hard for you once you're reduced to Ireland.

I agree that life should be hard for the Irish (...Wow. I just said that, didn't I?). But it shouldn't be impossible -- even keeping the same number of tiles, there should be enough food to provide a core population to keep the Celts from collapsing due to expansion.

Likewise for production -- they will never be global superpowers, but when the Romans arrived in Britain they encountered an army of over 4000 chariots (compare to the Battle of Kadesh, the largest chariot battle in history with 5-6000 Egyptian and Hittite chariots). That tells me that the Celts had at least some productive capacity...

That works too. I just think there should be more cities, particularly Celtic cities, built by the time the Romans go on their conquests. The Romans are well known as conquerors and administrators, not settlers. All of the major cities in Western Europe were first settled by the Celts or by the Carthaginians (in the case of southern Iberia).

I like this idea quite a bit.

I wonder if we should give the Romans a conqueror event against the Celts in 50 BC. That way, the human Celtic player would only have to worry about the starting stack initially, and would have enough time to prepare a defense against the Romans Legions. But it'd also guarantee that in AI vs. AI, Rome would have a very good shot at conquering Gaul and London at the historical time.

Woodsman II to further incentivize protecting Forests and to prevent them from being OP city defenders for Human Rome as would be the case if they had the Guerrilla line.

I like this, especially the double-movement and the renewed incentive to keep forests around, but how would that work? If a player hasn't built a Dun, would the unit still receive a default promotion for Woodsman II? Alternately, would it be possible for the Dun to provide "the next promotion along the Woodsman line" (so the Gallic Warrior would start with Woodsman I and receive II from the Dun, while everyone else would receive I from it...?)

This sort of confusion is why I was disinclined to go with another Woodsman promotion.

 

[IrishDragon]

I agree that life should be hard for the Irish (...Wow. I just said that, didn't I?). But it shouldn't be impossible -- even keeping the same number of tiles, there should be enough food to provide a core population to keep the Celts from collapsing due to expansion.

I'd agree with this. In 1800 Ireland's population was about 5.5 million as against 7.5 for England. Ireland is currently underpopluated compared to the rest of Europe (As an aside, one of the only if not the only country to have a smaller population now than in the 19th century?). It shouldn't be productive, but Ireland has always had enough food and exported it. If the country was managed differently and experienced a similar level of population growth as the UK, Holland, France etc. it could probably support 15-20 million. If independent it would presumably have followed the rest of Europe to the new world and Africa like other smaller European countries