Scenario Preview - The Desert and the Mountain
- Thread starter Plotinus
- Start date
Any updates?
The other taboo question...
I've been doing a lot of fiddling about and some play-testing. I think that the West African civs and Kanem-Bornu are more or less done and balanced. The West African game revolves around finding and claiming resources, before building the improvements that require them, which create treasure units, which are then loaded onto camels and taken to Morocco, Tunisia or Egypt... The main problem with this is that the AI don't take their treasure there, as a rule. So I think that this part of the game will be most fun as a MP game... I'm planning the MP element of the game as I go along rather than making it an add-on. I'm thinking of releasing several MP versions - one on a smaller map with fewer civs, and then a couple more which are full-size and with all the civs, but only half the map (because you can have only eight civs total on a MP map). So if you want to play the trading race MP, you can do it on one map; if you want to fight the Abyssinian wars, you can do that on another.
Kanem-Bornu turns out to be immense fun to play. I'm very pleased with that part. The game here consists of expanding as fast as you can and then splatting the other civs you meet. I think we can all see the appeal of that.
So I need to test the Nubians, Ethiopians and Falasha. At the moment, the AI is not very good at any of these civs, so a lot of the fiddling will concern trying to get the AI to behave appropriately. In particular, it shows no inclination to fight naval wars in the Red Sea. I think I need to alter the map in this region to provide a bit more space for everyone: there's not much potential for Makuria, in particular, being stuck with nothing but desert and flood plains.
One minor problem in all this is that I've just discovered I'm going to be leaving the country in three months to do a degree overseas, which means I have a lot of other stuff to wind up first... so the pace of development may slow slightly! Fortunately it's mostly fiddling about, so this can be done at the same time as more important things... at least in theory...
I've been doing a lot of fiddling about and some play-testing. I think that the West African civs and Kanem-Bornu are more or less done and balanced. The West African game revolves around finding and claiming resources, before building the improvements that require them, which create treasure units, which are then loaded onto camels and taken to Morocco, Tunisia or Egypt... The main problem with this is that the AI don't take their treasure there, as a rule. So I think that this part of the game will be most fun as a MP game... I'm planning the MP element of the game as I go along rather than making it an add-on. I'm thinking of releasing several MP versions - one on a smaller map with fewer civs, and then a couple more which are full-size and with all the civs, but only half the map (because you can have only eight civs total on a MP map). So if you want to play the trading race MP, you can do it on one map; if you want to fight the Abyssinian wars, you can do that on another.
Kanem-Bornu turns out to be immense fun to play. I'm very pleased with that part. The game here consists of expanding as fast as you can and then splatting the other civs you meet. I think we can all see the appeal of that.
So I need to test the Nubians, Ethiopians and Falasha. At the moment, the AI is not very good at any of these civs, so a lot of the fiddling will concern trying to get the AI to behave appropriately. In particular, it shows no inclination to fight naval wars in the Red Sea. I think I need to alter the map in this region to provide a bit more space for everyone: there's not much potential for Makuria, in particular, being stuck with nothing but desert and flood plains.
One minor problem in all this is that I've just discovered I'm going to be leaving the country in three months to do a degree overseas, which means I have a lot of other stuff to wind up first... so the pace of development may slow slightly! Fortunately it's mostly fiddling about, so this can be done at the same time as more important things... at least in theory...
Don't worry, it's not getting lost! The situation at the moment is that more or less everything is roughly in place. I've tested all the civs and I think got them more or less balanced. It's been a nightmare balancing the Ethiopians and the Falasha, as I don't want it to be too easy for either to wipe out the other, but I think it's more or less there. The Falasha, of course, begin with no cities or settlers, but they do get some seriously nasty units (buildable only in the later stages of the tech tree) with which to do as much damage as possible to Ethiopia in their initial assault. How well they do in the early game depends to a large degree on whether they manage to protect these units. Playing Ethiopia in this scenario is going to be very hairy but it should be quite fun - you must fight off both the Falasha and the Adalians whilst trying to build as many Wonders as you can. I'm almost wondering if I should have made Adal playable as well, but I think that would take too much effort! Nevertheless, playing the Ethiopian wars MP could well be very satisfying.
I think that this scenario will be pretty quick to play. The relatively small map - and only one era of techs - means it won't have the epic feel of some games. But a smaller, quick game is often more fun than a long, drawn-out one. It will vary quite a lot depending on who you play, of course.
I'm going to ask a few people soon if they'd like to test a beta version at some point in the near future to check for playability.
I think that this scenario will be pretty quick to play. The relatively small map - and only one era of techs - means it won't have the epic feel of some games. But a smaller, quick game is often more fun than a long, drawn-out one. It will vary quite a lot depending on who you play, of course.
I'm going to ask a few people soon if they'd like to test a beta version at some point in the near future to check for playability.
Sword_Of_Geddon
Arbiter of the Sword
If one were to renumber the conquests to include your scenerios Plotinus, where would this and the Rood and the Dragon go?
There's an interesting question. The Rood and the Dragon goes from the fifth century to the tenth or thereabouts, so I think it should go between the Fall of Rome and the Middle Ages (though it overlaps with both). The Desert and the Mountain obviously doesn't quite fit into the "story" of the Conquests, which are basically about Europe and western civilisation, apart from the Sengoku one and the Mesoamerica one. So I suppose it would go at around the same time as the Mesoamerica one - either before or after it - because it's supposed to go from AD 1000 to AD 1600 or thereabouts, that is, shortly before the European powers started messing about with the sub-Saharan interior.
Sword_Of_Geddon
Arbiter of the Sword
So Rood would be 4, and this would be anywhere between 6 and 8? 
Sword_Of_Geddon
Arbiter of the Sword
Don't be too hard on yourself..the conquests aren't that great
An update to let you know that I've pretty much got everything done now, apart from a bit of graphical polishing that I will leave until the end, so I'm going to see about getting it to some beta testers in the next few days. In fact I'm going to have a bit more time over the next couple of weeks (final day in my current job today, yayy!) so I hope to get it all done before enormously long, depending on what the beta testers think. I certainly want to get it all polished off in the next couple of months before I move abroad.
That's a very cool building! Luckily I'm pretty much there with buildings now so I probably won't need it. I'm using most of those Muslim buildings that Arne recently posted, which help to give a good "feel" to some of the civs, plus a few others nicked from here and there.
King Coltrane
King
Plotinus, i want to test too! this sounds amazing! i cant wait to try funneling camels up to egypt whilst defending them against bandits. I know its late for new ideas, but i thought id throw this out anyway... as a late "Ghana/Mali/Songhai" tech, how about "European Contact" which allows the wonder "Portugese Slave Trade" which could add 5% income? i know its not completely accurate, but its another nice little thing.
Looks Great so far, and please let me know if youd like another shiny new beta tester!
Looks Great so far, and please let me know if youd like another shiny new beta tester!
The Last Conformist
Irresistibly Attractive
I'll be a beta-tester too, if that's OK.
The Last Conformist
Irresistibly Attractive
The reason you don't see any fighting on the Red Sea is that the AI won't build warships to fight someone on the same continent.
You could try making the Sinai impassable if it's important to you.
You could try making the Sinai impassable if it's important to you.
In fact, Sinai is impassable as it is. I think that there would be fighting on the Red Sea if the player, as Ethiopia, tries to build ships to intercept the troop transports which do zip up and down it, mainly from Adal but also from the Ayyubids (whose territories on the Arabian peninsula and in the Levant can only be accessed by sea, because deserts are uncrossable). So I fear that this side of the scenario is unlikely to play a major role - but at least it's in there just in case!
The Last Conformist
Irresistibly Attractive
The desert is only impassable to wheeled units - I don't think that "counts" in the AI's eyes.
Similar threads
