Middle East PBEM

[Tigranes]

Mod: Middle East Mod 1948 by SvenRanulfsson.​

Download. PBEM adopted map attached. Join the game at
http://www.pbemtracker.com/game.php?gameID=207.

Player order (final):

Rodrigo Costa civ_addicted: (1)Iraq, (2)Egypt

Michkov: (3)Iran

Imp. Knoedel giorgako Michkov: (4)Israel, (5)Western Block

Tigranes: (6)Eastern Block, (7) Kurdistan

House Rules about Human Civs​

1. Players can trade cities only when returning them to the original 1948 owner or during peace negotiations after real, non-phony wars. 2 civs of the same player cannot fight each other.

2. Eastern and Western Block governed by special rules. (2a) Only they can defy (veto) UN resolutions. (2b) No open borders for them until 1953. (2c) No wars on/by them until 1956. In case of AI initiated wars no cities can be captured by them (even Barbarian) until 1956.

3. Permanent alliances with AI civs only.

4. Civics played important role in Cold War and special rules govern their change: Player has to disband one Great Person for each civic change every time (potentially more than one with more than one change during the same Revolution):
(4a) It takes Great General to change Government Civic
(4b) It takes Great Spy to change Legal Civic
(4c) It takes Great Engineer to change Labor Civic
(4d) It takes Great Merchant to change Economy Civic
(4e) It takes Great Prophet to change Religion Civic

(4f) It takes Great Spy infiltration each time regular spy changes human opponent's civic. No rules about AI civ's civic changes.

(4g) UN resolutions about civics cannot be proposed by humans and must be vetoed by all humans in case silly AI controls UN.

5. Religion cannot be changed for the duration of the game. Neither for your civ nor by spy. See (4g) about UN.

6. UN played important role in Middle East conflicts. Human player controlling UN has to prioritize Peacekeeping! No other resolution can be brought forward while there is an option to vote for peace!

7. Apostolic Palace is representing Arab League, while votes of non Arab human Civs need to be understood as their ability to influence Arab world decisions to a certain degree. AP Resident can propose any resolutions but non-arab civs cannot defy them, just vote yes, no, abstain.

Victory Conditions: All except Culture. Obvious Victory -- Last man standing after eliminating all human civs.

 

[Tigranes]

So I finally have some time and can post some game related info.

General notes. Compared to most mods -- this one is very simple. And yet playable. I came up with all those annoying house rules because ... life is not simple. But mod still stays playable.

Main thing all the players have to understand about this scenario -- is that many weird things you will encounter in this mod are intentional. Like being able to build Hanging Gardens when you already flying planes. Hanging Gardens now represent Aliyah (or population boom) and Mausoleum Mausolus in Mashhad is representing mausoleum of Imam Reza. Sizes of cities might look unrealistic, but population points do not represent total population -- but rather "active", "available" population. That's why you can never "raze" a city.

Another very important fact about all that relatively underdeveloped land and cities reflects modder's intention to make this long lasting "building and warring" scenario. Not just warring. There will be long periods of peace with tension in the air. 1948 marks a new beginning of a long saga we still witnessing today. Not just warring. Even though you start with a war -- things will stabilize very quickly, and house rules about UN and civics will help with that. Do not expect Israel going down in one war or capturing the entire middle east quickly. Game is running on Epic speed, there are no way to rush buy things quickly, "limited" is the key word to describe every player's abilities. Things will unfold and develop over time, this will not be a 100 turn game, we might need to play many turns before something exciting will happen, so please try to play your turn within 48 hours or post here at least when you cannot.

Civ specific notes.

Eastern Block and Kurdistan: Stolenray -- do not get surprised discovering Great Wall around your borders: it is an Iron Curtain of course . Cold War is just starting and it will take you pretty long wait until you can open borders (1953) or engage in human on human wars (1956). Which kind of begs for the question -- what to do during all those turns. Why, tech and modernize your land of course. There is a Nuclear race, there is a Space race. Tons of espionage possibilities (the only way get techs from other in this game is to steal them). And keep looking for the way to switch from Police State to Universal Suffrage in order to use the benefit of your Kremlin Wonder. You have few limited possibilities here. The simplest one is to wait until 1953 when Stain is dead, open borders with your own Kurds, receive their GG as a gift and delete him to change Government Civic. The other options may include provoking AI to declare on you (make arrogant demands), waiting for 1953 and cutting deal with Arabs (GG in exchange for gifts of Tanks and Air Force), and finally obtaining a GG yourself before 1953 with limited forces Greek Communists have in Greek Civil War (one of the first Cold War Conflicts). This mod only has 2 land units that can attack without declaring war -- Sunni and Shia Mujaheddins. Your Shia Mujaheddins near Albania represent DSE. They cannot capture cities or kill units in the city without official war, but can kill Greek units in country side, earning you Great General points (you only need 30). Unfortunately you only have 4 of DSE units and cannot build them ever again -- Civil War was winding down in 1948 -- so use them carefully. As in real life use Albanian territory to heal when damaged.

Before the mid-50s Kurds been the only Soviet allies in the Middle East. Iranians just crashed their short lived Republic of Mahabad. If you mouse over Kurdistan regions in Iran, Iraq, Turkey and Syria you can notice the presence of Kurdish culture. Most local Kurds under your control are hiding in Kurdistan mountains. Leader of armed forces of Republic of Mahabad Mustafa Barzani escaped to Soviet Union and was sent with few of his fellow guerrillas to Uzbekistan at the remote railway station which appears on the map as Kurdish capital. Again you have few limited options at the beginning. You can use your GG to switch to Universal Suffrage and use Soviet money to raise Kurdish Army (slow and expensive process as your "capital" cannot work any tiles). You can wait until 1953 to receive massive Soviet support and become the main proxy force for Soviets in the Cold War. Or you can cut a deal with human Iran and Iraq obtaining some Kurdish cities in return for allowing Muslims to focus on Israel. Many complex player to player negotiations are possible in this scenario, human diplomacy can be much more exciting than the one with AI.


Israel and Western Block. For the obvious reason this player is the clear protagonist in our game. Israel starts with Extern Support National Wonder, 3 Great People and 1 Great General. In the single player Games AI timidity allows human Israel to rebound from initial attack and do well in defeating his Arab neighbors. Luckily Egypt and Iraq are in the good hands now, so I am curious how things will play out before West starts to sell arms (open borders and gift units) with Israel. Western Block has Statue of Liberty, 2 External Support national wonders, 5 American Navy Seals, 1000 in gold, UN Wonder (with veto/defy power) and huge Emirates vassal, ruled by infamous retrograd Sultan of Omar, who even banned glasses in his kingdom ! It is important to treat him nicely, he may break away in case of excessive demands from the West, demanding Oil makes him to declare war, for example. Luckily Western Block has a huge influence in Iran, Iraq and Arabia (represented by initial 3000, 2000, 2000 points against the respective civs). This opens a wide door for negotiations, coercions and punishments against uncooperative Oil rich countries. Also it worth noting that only Paratroopers and Marines (and Israeli equivalents) can see invisible Guerrillas (not the Spies). Both West and Israel start with plenty of those important units. They also start with Corporations -- so plenty opportunities to create new corporations and enslave the volatile Middle East economically

Iran This civ has a great potential for growth but regressive civic might stifle it for a while. Lots of land to develop and even build new cities. Lots of resources to trade. No limitations on open borders/wars. Basically the most "play as you will" civ in game. Again I am curious which path will be taken by Iran. The most annoying thing of course is the strong western influence (initial espionage point advantage), balancing the espionage situation and shrewd diplomacy must become a priority. Also Shia Mujahedins can attack without declaring war (but they are not invisible). They can be very useful to solve a Kurdish issue by force (if diplomatic solution fails).

Egypt and Iraq Excellent diplomatic situation must be exploited by these civs. Most civs are Sunni, Nasser has a good chance to be elected Arab World's leader, smaller muslim civs feel pleased about Egypt and Iraq and can be persuaded to form permanent alliances eventually. Merging Egypt with Syria (as in real life) can allow human player to speed up research and abuse AI partner with demands. Many cities in Egypt and even Iraq have a good potential for growth, but obtaining better civics must become a priority. One thing needs to be realized by Arab player that time is not on Arab side. As soon as West will become to help Israel and later even engage in Suez Wars -- things could go horribly wrong. But of course both sides can agree to live peacefully for some time and cooperate instead -- especially if Eastern Block starts winning the Nuclear race or the Space race .

 

[Rodrigo Costa]

Hi there,

I'd like to pick up Iraq + Egypt

Cheers!

 

[Tigranes]

PBEM tracker link:

http://www.pbemtracker.com/game.php?gameID=207

Please join!

 

[stolenrays]

I'll be eastern block.

 

[Michkov]

Are you set on the players listed in the first post? If not I'd like to join as Iran.

 

[Tigranes]

Are you set on the players listed in the first post? If not I'd like to join as Iran.

Just PMed you... Waiting on keldath...

 

[Imperator Knoedel]

Aaaaaaaaaah why didn't you tell me you are already starting this game?

Dibs on Israel!

 

[Tigranes]

One Israeli guy might take Israel already, sorry. And then Michkov is on the line . We should play this in real time one night, just me and you.

 

[Michkov]

Joined on the tracker

 

[Tigranes]

And off we go! OP updated. Tracker is up and running -- Rodrigo got his first turn via tracker already. What a nice tool for PBEM players, second great thing that happened to Civilization after they codded Multiplayer .

 

[keldath]

im here
ill dl now

how does pbem works? never played...


**
got the mod, got the latest save from the tracker, but it fails on load.

any help guys? or did i miss the game?

***
ok i seem to have responded too late - can i somehow still join the game?

 

[Michkov]

Got the save, will play it later today. One more thing could you send out an email containing everyone in the game? I find Diplo works better over email and that way we got everyone's addresses in the same place.

 

[Tigranes]

im here
ill dl now

how does pbem works? never played...


**
got the mod, got the latest save from the tracker, but it fails on load.

any help guys? or did i miss the game?

***
ok i seem to have responded too late - can i somehow still join the game?

The only way to join now would be you replacing me. Your arrival reminded me the story of Saul waiting for Samuel. I almost want to start another game and compare situations 100 turns later.

Of course I will help you with loading issue. Many modders experience problems when they start playing PBEM games -- MP require all the players to have the same vanila BTS files, and some modders change those files on their disk during the years of modding.

For right now lets continue this game as is -- and me and you will resolve everything via private communication. I PMed you on July 19, the CFC receipt shows you have read my invitation on 20, so in lieu of your activity I started the game on 22nd, and you posted on 23rd

 

[Tigranes]

Got the save, will play it later today. One more thing could you send out an email containing everyone in the game? I find Diplo works better over email and that way we got everyone's addresses in the same place.

Mine and Rodrigo's email was emailed to you and yours to Rodrigo. stolenray is new to PBEM and should PM us his email

 

[Imperator Knoedel]

Hua wa? So instead of telling me that your friend didn't show up you just picked Israel for yourself? That's low Tigranes, really low.

 

[Tigranes]

Nooooo! I was acting very noble actually. Did not pick a civ. Let people chose their civs and took left overs. Israel and Western Block happen to be the most undesirable civs!

Spoiler :

Why you became feminist all of a sudden? Never seen you protecting women's rights

 

[Imperator Knoedel]

Why you became feminist all of a sudden? Never seen you protecting women's rights

You have never seen me defending Zionism either, doesn't mean I don't support it.

 

[Tigranes]

As the first MP of Israel I want to ask you a simple question: what is Zionism to you, without wikipedia.

GPSed! Critical UN and Arab League elections are next turn! Britain is running against Iran, and my British Arab Vassals (sultan of Omar) vs Nasser (who is still representing king Farouk). Foreign Office is open for business!

Nascent Jewish State is under attack by 4 civilizations, two of which are human! We have no aviation but managed to block Egyptian bombardement with our AA gun! And ... we won't sit in trenches, hiding from bombardment! First Israeli General David "Mickey" Marcus scored spectacular victory in daring raid into the Egypt-occupied Gaza killing a Machine Gunner! Unfortunately Jordanian forces blockading Western Jerusalem were able to retaliate against IDF division in Central Israel, which was trying to lift the siege. Our first win and our first lost days after Declaration of Independence!

 

[Imperator Knoedel]

As the first MP of Israel I want to ask you a simple question: what is Zionism to you, without wikipedia.

Jewish Nationalism, or to be more precise the political ideology that states that the Jewish people has a right to its own nation state, preferably in its ancient homeland of western Palestine. (between the Jordan and the Mediterranean)