Help me bring ancient Sparta to life

[Kyriakos]

I have begun work on a mod of my own, for CivIII. It is called The Rise of Sparta, and begins with the Spartan-Messenian war, then rivalry with Argos and finally the formation of the Peloponnesian league.

I plan to use units which already exist, there are tens of different hoplitai around, and create all the static gfx which are needed.

Here is a pic of the cities, the colony and the olives resource:

However i am not that good in the actual history of it all, and thought i could ask for help here

As a first question i would like to ask what resources should i have in the mod, apart from olives, wine, dyes, wool, and some other food ones. Strategic ones are gold, iron and copper up to now.

The timeline probably will be from 743 BC to 404 BC, but it might expand a bit more.

 

[Dachs]

It makes more sense to me to cut it off at ~362 BC, not 404. That way, you get Agesilaos and all the lovely, lovely chaos that arose from his fool Anatolian expedition.

I think you should add in slaves as a resource. Probably the most relevant one, honestly. Perhaps also a resource that permits shipbuilding, to restrict Spartan maritime power for much of the game - could be done with the tech tree too. A clay resource for pottery is probably a good idea too.

 

[Kyriakos]

It makes more sense to me to cut it off at ~362 BC, not 404. That way, you get Agesilaos and all the lovely, lovely chaos that arose from his fool Anatolian expedition.

I think you should add in slaves as a resource. Probably the most relevant one, honestly. Perhaps also a resource that permits shipbuilding, to restrict Spartan maritime power for much of the game - could be done with the tech tree too. A clay resource for pottery is probably a good idea too.

Great idea, of course pottery is needed

I am using a giga-map i made myself years ago, but it has no Anatolia in it so cannot really simulate expeditions outside of southern and central Greece. But i plan to have all permitted 31 greek civs in that area, from Locris to Melos and then to the north...

I want to use this map because it is by far the most detailed and largest made of this area, and also if i used a map of more areas then i could not have virtually all of the greek city-states of the era.

 

[Dachs]

The problem with that map is that it kind of makes an attempt to do a game up to even 404 nonsensical. For that, you need at minimum Thrace, the Anatolian coast, and the Hellespont. Otherwise, the war against Athens would probably be over in a few turns.

It is a very cool map, though.

 

[Kyriakos]

The problem with that map is that it kind of makes an attempt to do a game up to even 404 nonsensical. For that, you need at minimum Thrace, the Anatolian coast, and the Hellespont. Otherwise, the war against Athens would probably be over in a few turns.

It is a very cool map, though.

Thanks

Well i can always simulate those with "wonders" and resources, which appear and can be negative, but are set to be there once you have researched a tech you must get. So the disastrous Sicilian campaign can be depicted through such resources which detract food and shields from Attica. This is just one idea, there will be others too

 

[LightSpectra]

It's amazing to me that modded Civ3 graphics not only look better than Civ4, but also Civ5 graphics.

 

[Kyriakos]

It's amazing to me that modded Civ3 graphics not only look better than Civ4, but also Civ5 graphics.

Thank you

Btw it would be really great if someone knows the following:

-A trusted site with maps of the Greek world in the era the mod begins.

-Concept art for an ancient Greek Mine.

-site with emblems/flags/banners of the city states. I need these primarily for choosing the civ colors

I will try to compile a civ list later on. It is almost certain that some civs will have to appear which possibly formed later on. I also thought of having a special "rebel" civ, to simulate rebellion in colonies, such as the one in the once Corinthian Kerkyra.

 

[Dachs]

-A trusted site with maps of the Greek world in the era the mod begins.

Go nuts:

Spoiler map :

More on this site (linked in my sig).

 

[Kyriakos]

Looks like a great site

Years ago, when i was trying to create a Peloponnesian war scenario using this map i had found a site with actual colored borders of the various nations. Ever seen such a thing? I could really use it now

 

[Dachs]

I tend to think that most colored borders of such would be a fantasy, especially before the Persian War.

 

[GoodGame]

IDK, but maybe leather (as sandals) would be a luxury, or as a strategic resource.

And marble.

Definitely agree that slaves (Helots) should be a resource.

 

[tesb]

lecture on sparta:
http://academicearth.org/lectures/sparta
hope it helps you

 

[Kyriakos]

Pottery resource finished (the amphora between Sparta and the Barricade)

Any ideas about what an ancient mine should look like? Also, a site with emblems/flags of the greek world?

 

[Virote_Considon]

If you did want to include Thrace/Anatolia/etc, it is possible to increase the size of the map using MapTweaker.

 

[GoodGame]

IDK, wikipedia talks about the silver-lead mines in Laurium (Lavrio).

I think this is the best source I could google quick (would be nice if there was a decent archealogical examination of the mines):
http://www.unc.edu/~duncan/personal/roman_mining/deep-vein_mining.htm

A shaft goes down to the mineral, and then a horizontal gallery is dug for the workers.

 

[Kyriakos]

Thank you Goodgame

The problem with that is that it would not look good as a 2d graphic, and i have to take into account looks as well as authenticity

For example i created this dock terrain:

I robbed the concept art for it from the freeware 3d strategy game "0 ad", in which a similar building is the "ancient Hispanic dock". I hope that it does not look that different from a small ancient Greek dock though... I also modelled the greek dock from 0 ad but i did not like how it looked in civIII size.

 

[Kyriakos]

You can also suggest great wonders to add. I can make a few. This is one still hellenic, but from a later era:

 

[W|M]

I think the following wonders would be appropriate:

The Palace of Knossos
The Oracle of Delphi
The Theatre of Epidaurus
The Colossus of Rhodes
The Olympics
The Parthenon
The Temple of Artemis
The Mausoleum of Mausollos
The Olympian Temple of Zeus

 

[Kyriakos]

Can someone provide me with the list of messenian towns and their capital (was it Messene?) in the map Dachs posted in post 8?

I finished the ancient mine, although i am not sure how authentic it is since my main concept art was Age of Empires.

 

[W|M]

I think the olives should be less of a circular shape, and more oval.