MA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights 1.01)
 

MA Al-Nadim: The Thousand and One Nights
http://nikita.tnnet.fi/~elmokki/alnadim-recruitable.png
http://nikita.tnnet.fi/~elmokki/alna...oandsummon.png
Magic levels etc in images might be outdated. Militia hasn't existed since 0.87, there's now light infantry that's essentially a leather armored spear infantry. Also Beduin Sorcerer is not in the picture.

I personally won't link to Dominions 3 content made by me any more and I hope no-one else will either (old links are fine, whatever). You should be able to find them or most of them by asking on IRC or googling the other forums

0.92 (15.3.2011)
Fixed summon paths and tweaked higher tier summons.

0.93 (18.3.2011)
- Beduin cavalry tweaked to be more in line with Sauromatia light cavalry
--> Beduin troops hp, att and def reduced 12 -> 11
--> Beduin Raider gold cost 40 -> 20
--> Beduin Mounted Archer gold cost 40 -> 18
- Mubarizun gold cost 18 -> 15
- Mubarizun commander hp 13 -> 16 to be more in line with for example Marverni Boar Lords.
- Dervish gold cost 25 -> 20
- Camel unit prices lowered to be more in line with similiar powered cavalry units
--> Camel Cavalry price 50 -> 25
--> Camel Archer price 25 -> 20
- Camel sprites got a very subtle tweak
- (lesser) Marid stats brought to be more in line with (lesser) Ifrit stats.
- Marids of all levels get glamour again. There's a risk this is overpowered, but we'll see.
- Alchemits research bonus increased 2 -> 3
- New unit: Beduin Sorcerer
--> Mounted mage with 1F1E and 110% FEW, stealthy and 140g cost

1.00 (24.3.2011)
- Nametype of 79 names implemented (id 151)
- Llamabeast's id changes and spelling corrections implemented
- All djinni have #gcost 0 to remove upkeep
- Viziers and Grand Viziers are slightly younger. Viziers should now never be old when you recruit them and Grand Viziers should still be old, but a bit less so and with luck maybe barely not old.
- Beduin Sorcerer pathes changed to 1S and 110% FSE, 100% FE

1.01 (27.9.2011)
- Summon Lesser Ifrits/Marids moved up in research (4 -> 6), named to "Summon Band of Lesser Ifrits/Marids" and increased cast requirements by one level of magic (2W/F -> 3W/F)
- Added Summon Lesser Ifrit/Marid at conj4, summons 1 marid/ifrit for 2 gems at 2W or 2F.
----

Weapons: 915-916
Units: 3622-3657
Nation: 85
Sites: 788-789

Copypaste:

Al-Nadim is a mod nation inspired by the One Thousand and One Nights and Arabian culture in general. The mod is in no way supposed to be a realistic representation of Persian/Arabian/Middle-Eastern nations of the time, but more of a generic Arabian nation that makes a player that isn't a huge history buff feel like he's playing a mod where there are turbans, scimitars and camel riders.

Unit list as of 0.91. Pictures below should be only used for graphical examples, the unit stats won't be correct.

Units:
- Light Infantry (spear, shield, light armor)
- Infantry (spear, shield, medium armor)
- Infantry (scimitar, shield, medium armor)
- Beduin Mounted Archer (scimitar, short bow, light armor, mounted, stealthy)
- Beduin Raider (scimitar, shield, light armor, mounted, stealthy)
- Camel Archer (scimitar, composite bow, light armor, mounted, awesome)
- Camel Cavalrey (scimitar, shield, medium armor, mounted, awesome)
- Dervish (two scimitars, almost no armor, sacred, berserk, high stats)
- Mubarizun (scimitar, shield, medium armor, high stats, capital only)

Commanders:
- Al-Nadim Scout
- Assassin (a custom al-Nadim variant that's fairly similiar to the default one)
- Al-Nadim Commander
- Beduin Chieftain
- Camel Commander
- Mullah (H1 priest, decent commander)
- Mystic (stealthy, H1S1 magic)
- Vizier (2F1W 110% FAWS)
- Mubarizun Commander (capital only)
- Alchemist (1E2? 210% FAWE, capital only)
- Imam (3H, capital only, old)
- Grand Vizier (2F2W1S 110% FAWS, capital only)

Summons:
- Camels
- Ghul (stealthy death/fire mage with seducing and ability to turn to a were-hyena)
- Ifrits (3 tiers, fire/earth mages with some skill in death and astral)
- Marids (3 tiers, fire/water mages with some skill in air and astral)

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

Those sprites are looking good - and I like the proliferation of mounted units: mobility on the battlefield should be a major advantage of an Arabian faction.

If you're setting up al-Nadim against Hinnom, you could play off of the tangle of myths surrounding <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qur'anic_account_of_Sulayman">Sulayman/Solomon</a>, in which he tamed, captured or enslaved the jinns (or, according to <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goetia">Christian Goetic sources,</a> the demons of hell) - that could make for an interesting hero, at least

And if you decide to do a MA version, you could go with a "Great Caliphate" theme - think of something a little like EA Aeroscaphle and MA Tien Chi: that would play off of the scholars, poets and alchemists of the 1st & 2nd Caliphates and the anti-Caliphate (Moorish Spain) - these historical empires had their heyday during Europe's "Dark Ages."

I don't have much advice regarding Arabic mythology - the previous paragraph was drawn from what I remember from some of my undergraduate history courses.

Another thought: it might be interesting to imagine them as caught between Abyssia (which incorporates some Middle-Eastern tropes) and Hinnom. If you don't want to do a MA version of al-Nadim, that's more than enough explanation.

Sorry, that's probably too many suggestions too quickly. I'm like that when I get going. :rant2:

Short version of this post: Neat! :) I can't wait to see more.

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

Those graphics look nice. Good editing.

Also, IIRC someone did a nation waaaay back (like 2 years ago) with arabic themes. Can't remember the name thought. Perhaps a forum search could help?

Also, you should understand that F & A is the suckiest path combo in Dominions. You only have one (niche) crosspath spell and the only forgeable item is an artifact. I suggest that you add some national Fire/Air and Air/Fire spells for them*. You also could consider making a new Air & Fire item to forge.

*Some humble suggestions for Air/Fire spells
- A national version of "Blessing of the Desert Winds" from my CPCS mod. (which gives flaming arrows + air shield on small area)
- Battlefield summon for weak imp-like djinns?
- "Wrath of the Desert" - spell that sucks out all water from the opponents causing sever dehydration (fatigue damage, mr negates or die?)
- Sand Storm - fatigue damage + mr easily negates blindness? Hmm.. actually this sounds more like air/earth

The only way is to do this is give the hero a modded nametype with only one name on the list. Althought it's pretty wasteful to spend an entire nametype on a single hero.

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

Perhaps the heavier troops and cavalry should have helmets, graphically?

I like the look of it very much so far - simple, clean changes result in good looking dom3 style troops. It fits in with haida gwaii, alchera, shangrila etc as very dom3 style nations.

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

I was totally brainstorming ideas for a nation based off of Arab myth a few months back. I think it has real potential to be a fantastic nation thematically. The way I saw it the EA version could be based wholly on pre-Islamic Arabia, followed by MA in which 'the prophet' arises and you have a conflict between the old polytheistic sects and the followers of the prophet/pretender (muslims). Finally in LA the new religion has taken over.

For the EA version, which I'd been thinking about first, I thought it'd be neat to have the troops divided by the city vs desert. You'd have the disciplined city troop and cavalry to do the heavy lifting, backed by the wise and learned scholars and mages that only a metropolis can cultivate. There'd be splendidly bejeweled captains of the Magnificent Host, culled from the royal families to lead the armies. Then there'd be the other units from the desert, based on the Bedouin. Could be stealthy raiders or ferocious fighters with poorer moral, maybe have a mystic or shaman to lead them.

Of course then there'd be so many types of djinn to summon that you could easily make it a summon-intensive nation too. I guess I'm just rambling, so I'll say I really like the theme and wish you luck!

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

Ooh, this looks exciting and the graphics are very nicely done.

I have two graphical comments though. Firstly, it looks off to me that they all have naked legs. Shouldn't they be wearing full-length robes, or perhaps billowy trousers? (my Arabic knowledge is poor at best, althuogh as it happens I am currently writing from a library full of Arabic students!)

Secondly, I think the source graphic for the viziers is unfortunately one of the lower quality graphics in dominions, so they don't quite match up to the excellent quality of your other graphics. They're still fine, it's just noticeable that they're not quite as good.

All in all I'm very much looking forward to this mod!

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

Oh yeah, and I really like the spinning thing for the dervish, but is he meant to look like he has very long grey hair? Cos he kind of does at the moment.

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

While we're on the subject of graphics, it might be an idea to get the horse rearing up graphic from the vanilla sprites and apply it to the attack sprites of your non missile cavalry - currently the movement from one sprite to the next is a bit too subtle for a large (size 3) unit.

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

Yeah, that's why I wanted to give them more diversity. In the end, fire feels like the only path that really is mandatory for a nation that is centered on djinn/efreeti/whatever, especially as I consider them to be more elemental beings than angelic (or demonic) beings, so I guess it might be a decent idea to give the mages some fire and a random chance of getting several fire/water/air/earth random picks. That'd allow more synergy, though it'd also give a rather good diversity since I was also thinking of sage-like astral scholars.

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

I wanted to add that first, poking from under the white turbanish thing that covers their head, since that seemed realistic, but I failed at my first try so I ended up with everyone having their helmets completely covered. Got to see if I get better results next time I'm bored enough to start tinkering with sprites :)

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

Agreed. I really don't know how I could forget the trousers. If anything, they should be more realistic than naked legs.

True, the graphic just happened to suit them very well. I'll definately remake them along with the other stuff when I do things like modify the mubarizun sprite for a mubarizun commander. That is, if I find a better sprite to base them on.

His upper body is apart from arms pretty much completely from the normal indy priest, and I can't see a long grey hair in either of the sprites myself. Though it might be a good idea to edit the sprite to show more neck.

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

Agreed, the problem is though, how can I get non-antialiased (or whatever is blurring the sprites ingame) sprites? The bases I currently have are from sprite dumps, but they sadly don't have the attack sprites. For viziers I took a screenshot and built from that, but completely redrawing a rearing horse from a somewhat ok model is a bit too much work if I can get a proper sprite from somewhere.

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

If you look in the modding tools thread, I'm pretty sure there's a link to all the vanilla sprites in a zip there.

If you can't find it let me know and I'll upload my copy of it.

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

There's a download for all vanilla graphics in the first post of Sprite Editing Tutorial.

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

Ah, I bet the imperfect source image was why I thought the vizier looked a bit funny. If you use the image from the sprite archive he should look better I think.

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

Any news on this? I'm really looking forward to it.

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

Congratulations!
At last this idea is taken by someone who can draw! :)
There were some discussions on this already, but I would point to the one where my own opinions were stated:
http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/showthread.php?t=38342
There is also another thread currently active.
In short, I think that the EA nation should be mostly genie-based with human nomads as subject race, with MA being based on Khaliphate era (my own version was mostly based on 10th century) and LA on Osmanic Empire.
I agree about difference between city and Bedhuoin troops - you can look up how it was realised in my own attempt in the thread link above.
Considering magic and genies my own short research had shown that appropriate paths should include some Astral (astrology was relatively common, plus genies were often stated as knowing fate of people - plus Arabic folklore is the only place where I've seen something that could be characterized as teleport before 20th century authors). Another thing often mentioned, but mainly with female genies is turning people to animals, charm and production of food/wine - all from Nature path in Dominions. What I decided about this also can be found in the thread above. ;)
As for your graphics - while I myself am not good enough at pixel art (which has already stopped 2 projects), I think yours are good. And I do not think that you should necessarily use an existing tradition of depicting horses in action as rearing. Another thing - Arabs didn't use composite bows like Turks or Mongolians. Their bows were better than common Western design, but not by much, and they didn't particularly like shooting warfare - maybe because of the risk to horses. What they should certainly have is light lancers with very fast horses - which could be deadly at first strike... Later they began to employ a northern Turkish nomads specifically as mounted archers - but those were most often relatively heavy troops (by the way, in Dominions these should be people related to those which conquered Tien Chi in LA, but no name for them is officially given:( )... If you agree with the general concept I propose or have further questions - I am ready to answer and/or provide some content (as are possibly those who took part in previous discussion ;) ).
So, please continue your good work - twenty centuries are looking at you! ;)

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

Actually, the arabs as of the crusades favored mounted archers, and did use composite bows almost exclusively. Their favorite tactics include riding up to opposing cavalry and firing at close range to shoot the horses out from under them (European cavalry of the time did not wear barding typically, and not at all in the crusades because of exhaustion concerns), and pretending to run away while firing behind them to lead their pursuers into a trap. Islamic mounted archers of the time were perhaps the most accurate in the world, and the practice of archery was quite popular because of Mohammad's pronouncement that archery was the only sport the angels stopped to watch.

Islamic heavy cavalry at the time did not use lances, although they did use spears. The prepared warrior also carried a sword, mace, and axe - although the sword was the preferred weapon (for a number of reasons, but most likely because Mohammad states that the sword is a holy weapon). The idea of a heavy cavalry charge, european style, was shocking to them in the first crusade (and possibly accounts for some crusader wins against superior numbers).

The armor of their light and heavy cavalry was nearly identical - typically a maille shirt, leggings, heavy boots, a metal cap - often worn under turban and robes, although sometimes a metal cuirass was worn on top of this. Heavy cavalry carried a shield.

(Note, in proper usage, 'light' means the unit had a ranged weapon and claims nothing about armor.)

I can provide sources.

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

Tell me squirreloid, does this misuse of the word "light" by dominions bother you? ;)

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

Yes, yes it does.

Actually, the rampant misuse of the term by fantasy fans in general does.

I'm pretty sure military buffs get it right, because the distinction between light and heavy still exists, its just weirder now than it was pre-1900.

(Light cavalry today is aircraft. Heavy cavalry is tanks. The light/heavy infantry distinction is, iirc, a matter of armament, mostly to correspond to the historical unit vs. unit dominance paradigm. Ie, with equal training HI > HC; LI > (HI,LC); LC > (HI,HC); HC > LI). So infantry with anti-tank weapons is heavy, and other infantry is light, although with typical modern dispersal of weapon types across squads its no longer really a squad-level distinction)

Of course, dominions also suffers from the 'cavalry is awesome just because it is' syndrome, something also typical of fantasy buffs with little actual military knowledge, and generally based on the dominance of the knight in early medieval europe (which happened because the infantry *did not* have equal training or appropriate weaponry) and a fascination with chivalry and the medieval knight. Such people tend to ignore, eg, Bannockburn (Scotts used makeshift pikes to destroy a cavalry charge) or Avignon (entirely infantry English massacre french cavalry). In addition to not just melting against pikemen, cavalry also get a defensive bonus just for being cavalry. Actual military theory suggests the opposite (cavalry is worse at attacking and defending than infantry because they need to control the horse and fight, whereas the infantry can just concentrate on fighting - heavy cavalry's primary use is therefore running down light infantry).

Ok, this was much longer than intended. Lets just sum up by saying I wish people who did games like this were better at doing their homework.

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

Well, you probably remember that Seljuks were not Arab people... ;) I've said that they used Turk mercenaries and/or warrior slaves specifically for this. Pretending to run away certainly took place often. Firing at close range - surely (by the way, Arab farisi often did that with javelins). Generally, hit-and-run tactics was common for Arab warriors. But they didn't use archery so much nor so exclusevely as is often thought. While they often attacked in hand-to-hand.
As for mounted archers... Islamic - probably, Arab - no. And even for the first point you shouldn't say so when you surely remember that the Mongols emerged on the historical scene right at this time! :D For them this was not a sport for angels - but a means to feed their childern... Really, I don't know of a case where individual Turkish and Mongolian bows were tested at the same conditions - but as for using them in mass, Bayazed the Lightning was sent into Tamerlan's capital in an iron cell...

What you mean by lances then? THey surely didn't use "hand battering rams" of later knights - but then, neither did European knights of the time... ;) They used what is called in the game "light lance" - a long spear used specifically by cavalrymen. Considering other weapons - yes, certainly. I can even add that an Arabian mythology of a sword predates Mohammed (while poetry begins to speak in bow metaphors only after conquest and absorbtion of Persia, by the way). Considering charges I'd say that they probably didn't often perform charges which should carry them through the enemy. Anything more definite would be an overstatement. As for reasons for success of "Franks" in first Crusade - I think there was a number of them, but I didn't study this one in particular detail. There is an opinion that Western knights just used taller and more heavy horses than those in use in Levant and so had a definite advantage in head-on collision. Something may be attributed to difference in armor (even though it was not so big as is often depicted). There were also political reasons... Though the tactics crusaders used had played their role also (but these tactics also included things other than massed mounted charge!).
And of course, considering superior numbers - we should not take crusaders' reports literally. For example, it's certain that the numbers of Constantinopolis' defenders against the 4th Crusade were much less than Villehardouin states. The same is proved in many other instances.

I wouldn't even be so preposterious as to insist that they HAD definite light and heavy cavalry which had this specific difference in equipment! :D There was difference between farisi and nomad cavalry, yes. Both had warriors with differing arms and armor, yes. But mainly the difference was on individual level, with more wealthy warriors having better equipment (unless they considered speed to be of more advantage, of course!). Joinville states that Bedhouines never wear armor, but I think that it may be a rhethorical overstatement (or he didn't consider light armor they did wear as armor. or any number of other reasons. But this shows that their equipment was lighter as a rule).

Ha! You think there is a proper usage?! I've heard several such... :D And in contemporary sources... I remember such termins used by Byzantians (in the usage you consider improper, mostly, afair), but neither Westerners nor Arabs. As for later terminology, it was quite certain in case of cavalry and had no relation to either weapon nor armor: it depended on which horses this type of cavalry used! Unfortunately, using this is unpracticable in case of Dominions... ;) Generally, light vs heavy is defined on the basis of mobility, tactical and mainly strategical. This mobility comes for the cost of lighter equipment, so heavy troops have general advantage on the battlefield. So, for example, pavise crossbowmen were never "light" troops. And while hussars and cuirassirs both had missile weapons and swords, the former were light troops and the latter heavy (and carabineers - really, cuirassirs without cuirass - were heavies, too).

So, generally, can I. Isn't it interesting? ;) (except I really don't remember 1st Crusade. But if you insist, I can look up primary sources on this...)

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

So, I need to dig up sources for some of the rest of your comments, but I am quite certain on this point. The mongols were just coming into mesopotamia during the time of the crusades, and were even initially friendly towards the crusaders (and hostile to the Islamic empire). Thus they certainly weren't 'mongol' or other steppes tribe archers - those would certainly come later, but not during the (at least early) crusades. It wouldn't be until the mongols switched to preferring Islam to Christianity (due to the death of a leader - the Ilkhan maybe? - who was pro-Christian) that steppes tribe archers would become avaialable.

Now, what I read didn't make it clear if the archers are specifically arab - i'd guess they were drawn from across the islamic world, which may have included various middle eastern peoples such as persians, egyptians, etc...

First of all, the 'lance' as we think of it requires the invention of the stirrup, so pre-stirrup (before ~900AD) cavalry clearly aren't using a 'lance' as we mean it.

A 'light lance' still has some technological innovations which separate it from a spear, such as a crossbar behind the head to stop penetration from going too deeply (so it can be withdrawn and used again relatively quickly). We have artistic evidence for such a device in Byzantium at around the time of the crusades, I know.

Lance, especially the mechanical benefits the game employs, requires that it be couched and the momentum of the horse used as the primary force behind the weapon. This is what constitutes the effectiveness of the european heavy cavalry charge.

This is more confusing because the term lance is older than the object that matches our modern conception of a lance, and was basically any spear-like object generally when used from horseback. Thus period sources may use the term, but they don't necessarily mean what we mean by the term.

European horses were actually smaller than their islamic adversaries' horses - which was why muslim forces used barding in the hot climate while the europeans didn't - less risk of exhausting a larger horse. European horse stock got larger as a result of the first crusade because they could interbreed arabian horses with european horses.

Armor was indeed mostly equivalent, at least in type. Not sure about quality.

And political reasons explain the 1st crusades strategic advantage, but not its apparent tactical advantage. AFAICT the tactical advantage is due to the heavy cavalry charge and the crossbow, both of which we have contemporary muslim comments about.

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

So let's start digging! :)
As for Mongols' disposition you are quite right. But you've said that Islamic archers were the best in time. ;) So, while I'm not sure at all about Hungarians (who even sometimes took part in Crusades afair, being Catholic) and while Byzantines were not better in horse archery than Turkish peoples, the Mongolians provided clear example that your overstatement was somewhat too bold... :D
As for archers available I've said that they came from Turkic tribes. Mongolians weren't the only people on the steppes at the time - though they came to be their overlords.
Considering switching to Islam - it came to western Hordes with succession of Ouzbek-khan to the throne. Before this time they had a complete freedom to choose among their old shamanic faith, Islam, Christianity (Orthodox or Nestorian mainly) or Buddhism. Some leaders of early period were Christian , while others saw a political advantage in making common cause with Christians against Islamic states. Joinville writes that these negotiations came to naught due to "the Khan" offering Lois X to become his subject (not that this wasn't inappropriate considering difference in their power at the moment! ;) )

I wouldn't say egyptians as these people were mainly non-combatant by the time of islamic conquest. Military elite in this country consisted of foreigners almost(?) exclusively. Persians quite probably, but I don't know how many of their warrior caste was drafted into Islam armies and how many were killed or banished. Turkic peoples of the steppes (there were many tribes of them), however, were available and it's known that they were used, forming core of Ghulams and Mamluks in various Islamic states.

Yes, though first stirrups are dated somewhat earlier afaik - at about 5-6th centuries AD. This is on the steppes, however. In Europe they appeared later, but the heavy cavalry of Charlemaigne already had them afair. Another 2 things which you need for true lance are deep "western" saddle and preferably cuirass to take an impact from you shoulder to this saddle. (also see below)

I'd name such a weapon ranseur... And using this as a distinhuishing feature you'll have to drop weapons of the later cavalry to "non-lance" category. But 18-19 century ulans (sp.), cuirassirs and Cossacks used them from horseback on charge quite handily. And these were specific cavalry weapons, to be used on charge.

The part about momentum is true. But there is more than one way to use it. The first one known was probably contos - another "battering ram" which Macedonian heavy cavalry affixed to horses themselves with quite qood results. Later Alans and other steppe peoples used their lances two-handed. Byzantines also took this approach for a time iirc.
As for "european" charge (and you must remember that Byzantium and Hungary are also a part of Europe, even if you won't include Russia! :) ) you've quite probably seen the depiction of Willhelm of Normandy taking England. Here it's clearly seen that couching is used as only one of ways of using spear/lance. At the same time, Ousama ibn Munkidh's memoirs clearly state at least one case where he used couching attack (I think it's also mentioned by Joineville). But "eastern" saddle wasn't so good for this method (as rider sits higher, often rising from the saddle altogether - making it more useful for archery). So they never came to using couching and heavy ("true") lances exclusively (and Poles, e.g. used couching, but lighter lances) - still, they used relatively heavy weapon held two-handed which allowed usage of the horse's momentum on charge (yes, it still wasn't as good for this as classical lance, but it was often enough - and this technics was also useful for fencing with it.
Returning to mounted charge, it was a function of horses' speed and mass - but it also depended on the formation as a whole. One knight was relatively harmless - it was a coordinated attack of a formation of them which caused enemies to flee or be trampled under hooves. The later term for this was an "attack en murraile"(sp?), i.e., "as a wall", many knights (or later cuirassiers) coming at an enemy at one moment, declining them an opportunity to combine against any one knight or sidestep his attack. If I had to name any one thing that constitutes efficiency of a mounted charge, I'd name this. An additional advantage of it was that if lighter troops wanted to evade such a charge, they had to either ride directly from attacking heavies or risk that their "tail" would be caught in the charge and killed off (with this risk rising proportionally to their numbers, by the way). And with troops without discipline of Mongols riding directly from enemy attack could easily turn into a complete route...

Surely. But this is so with most weapons - conventional terms appear later, either with dedicated fencing schools, or with regular armies, bureaucracy and logistics. What is broadsword, for example? Anything which isn't a fencing sword/rapier and isn't short. At different times and places it could be two-handed weapon, Scottish claybeg, medieval one-handed sword, Cuirassier's sword - or Chinese falchion-like weapon! And this is relatively late term... Generally, a specific name followed a specific use of a weapon - so we can quite readily consider that if a weapon was named so, it was used in this way. And in context of the game we may consider without fear of reprisal from Language Police ;) that a weapon designed and used in a specific way should have appropriate stats...

I'm not so sure about this. It's certainly known that knights often stated that they didn't have good horses. It's known, of course, that they used Arabian blood to mingle with their horses. But Arabian line is much smaller than modern European ones! There are very tall horses of Persian and Caucasus lines - but I remember no evidence that they actually were used for breeding of European lines. Do you? Of course, a hybrid of far-removed lines can become larger and stronger than either of them... But this doesn't support a thesis that Arabian line was larger either. And what you base a thesis of smaller horse being exhausted easier on? I can say that the lines which have the longest wind among modern horses are Mongolian and Cossak lines - both smallish, though thicker than Arabians...
Unfortunately, most sources on earlier horse lineage were written by professionals for professionals - and they considered that anyone who would read their books would already know general lines and terminology by heart. Plus, many things were written down from hearsay, without attempts to really analyse lines' genesis. Still, there are some things which can be rejected based on logic and hard evidence, and some things can be proved on this. What made you think that Arabian horses were larger?

Crossbow surely. This remains to be the same by the time of Lois the Holy. Ibn Munkidh mentions it also, iirc. The line or ring of dismounted knights is another thing mentioned often (particularly in Richard Lionheart's crusade). Charge is mentioned, but I don't remember particular Muslim comments. What I do remember is that it was quite successful in cases whan it was massed, organized and driven home. Meaning that formation and at least some discipline were important, more than couching as such...

(in the game, by the way, it means high Morale of knights - meaning also that you were right about making Arab-based non-sacreds with lower morale... At the same time, light lances are quite appropriate. Also, Arab horses should be better than those of other light cavalry)

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

I made some better attack sprites for some units. Can't say the viziers' attack sprites are much better than the old ones, but slightly anyway. Need to find a better sprite to base them on, but I do like the non-attack sprite.

I tried making a helmet that pokes from the headpiece of those soldiers, but I failed miserably. Does anyone have a good idea on how to make the soldiers look like they have helmets while still keeping them arabic enough looking?

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

One thing to make your life a lot of easier: you can really go easy on the attack sprites. As long as there is something moving and no "bugs"(like changes in equipment), it'll be fine, trust me on this. About the vizier pic, I've actually used the attack sprite as a base for a unit (see the Holy War mod preview mod, link in sig, feel free to use it if you want.), I really like the pose (actually, to make a vizier hero, just gove the attack sprite a wand or something and tadaa! new unit!).

Second thing to make your life easier: Cover stuff up. Example: I was making the graphic in my avatar, but couldn't make the shading in the waist look right after 30 minutes of shading & re-shading I just copy-pasted that girdle on him. Problem solved.

I mean, would be such a stretch just to assume that they can wear helmet under that turban?

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

I thought that was what they did. Or was that in India?

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

That IS the original approach I took after my first failure the first time I tried to make decent looking arabic headgear ;)

But yeah, sure, if I can't get a proper helmet-poking-under-a-turban I'll just skip that.

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

The look I was originally after is lookable at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Mo..._caliphate.PNG

The current look is far from that, but I'm relatively happy with it.

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

Here's some more units. Most are just improved older sprites though. Remember, instead of EA I've decided this is MA. All that recruitable djinn stuff suits better for EA.

The descriptions in the image are just preliminary and do apparently lack helmets, which will mostly be reinforced leather caps and iron caps.

The image is lacking atleast:
- Scout (shortbow, scimitar, reinforced leather, stealth)
- Assassin (the generic one should be fine)
- Commander (armed like scimitar infantry)
- Mubarizun commander (armed like a mubarizun)
- Beduin leader (armed like a beduin raider)

I also have considered the following:
- Some capital only H3 priest
- Mystic (1S, 1H, stealthy, sacred, possibly a spy?)
- Some sort of scholar (= researcher) unit might suite quite well. I reckon it's either mystic or scholar though. Could be capital only.
- Some other chainmail armored cavalry unit
- A camel rider is an intriguing idea, but what purpose does it serve? Worse cavalry with wasteland survival isn't really a good enough niche to be worth it in most cases, and I think most if not all units deserve wasteland survival anyway. The EA version of this nation could have less horses and more camels as a theme of horses being rare though.
- Grand Vizier might be a capital only unit. Depends on how powerful the nation will end up being. The main mages won't be sacred, so that'll make them less powerful anyway though.
- Mubarizun are probably capital only, atleast if they're good enough. I might also call them with some other name, but this name shall suit for the time being.
- I am not happy with the magic paths of the two mages, but it's pretty hard to figure out what'd suit well. Current setup would probably make viziers too useless in combat.

Should the beduins be stealthy by the way? If so, should they have regular leather instead of reinforced leather? I'm a bit in between.

I did decide I'll make scimitars instead of using falchions. I guess they'll have the same stats as a longsword. That'll increase the survivability of sword infantry too.

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

The capital only H3 priest could be named a mufti. If you could individually hijack a nations option for a unique profit, while still keeping them playable, the dwarf smith could be a good option.

I'd imagine that Vizier's would have some combat utility stemming from the weak evocations, particularly fire combined with aim. Although forging additional boosters could be difficult.

If you would want to improve magical diversity you could always a recruitible everywhere magician with a crap shoot of elemental magic (FAWE)or another with minor death, and a chance at an elemental path.

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

I actually am rethinking if air is so crucial path to have atleast as a major one. Fire sure is, djinns are beings of smokeless fire, and astral feels correct too. Having water, air, earth or most of them as minor picks sounds interesting too though.

Anyway, viziers' problem was that 1F 1A can't do anything. It's 50% chance to get 2F or 2A and to be able to shoot atleast some proper evocations and 25% chance to get 1S for communions. 25% of the viziers would be useless apart from as researchers with their 1A 1F 1E paths. Not too awful though.

One draft for magics would be to make the viziers really versatile mages. For example something like following:

- Grand Vizier, 3F 1S, 200% AWES, 10% AWESF
- Vizier 2F 1S, 110% AWESF
- Mystic 1S (possibly 100% SD instead of 1S)

The 1S on especially vizier allows communions, making it always useful.

The problem just is that this'd produce a huge pile of crappy mages. I would love to use linked paths, 100% chance to have 2 levels of AWESF for grand vizier, but the modding commands for that make the modded units look buggy in recruiting screen.

Second option would be to have the following:

- Grand Vizier as it is
- Vizier as it is
- Mystic with 100% SD
- A scholar with 100% AWEF

But yeah, I don't know. It's pretty hard as I'd like to have plenty of viziers with different magic paths, but most setups lead to too many of them having relatively useless magic paths.

EDIT: Imam will be renamed mullah. That suits better for a H1 priest. Imam might be a seperate H2 priest or the H3 priest.

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

Evrything I say below is just an suggestion. Feel free to ignore my ramblings should you feel the need for it.

For the graphics, may I suggest that you just recolor the guys in the Holy War preview pic (under "The Celestial Choir")? Recoloring the white in them to black should probably make them blend nicely with the Imam pic you already got (a'k'a making black the color of the priesthood).


Well, your mages aren't currently very "combatique", perhaps you could give them minor bonus (like ~1) to compensate?

Well, if you can't see any justification for a unit (althought I agree that in EA camels would make more sense) it's better to just scrap it. There's no idea on filling the roster with useless units. It's just extra work for no gain.

I remember suggesting this some time ago, but it was probably in some other thread. National combat spells. Here are some ideas:

Desert Wind: AoE AP fire fatigue damage.

Djinn combat summon: This is depended upon how prevelavent the Djinns are in the MA, do you still have some as summons?

Trickery of the Djinn: Slightly better "Confusion".

Fury of the Desert: Troops buff that gives fire resistance + haste + (quickness?)

But you probably have better ideas, considering all the research you've done. If you aren't sure what is possible by spell modding, just ask. I happen to have some experience in the subject. If you need something complicated, I'd be more than happy to help you out with the code.

Hmm. Reinforced leather is basically normal leather armor with some metal plates hanging from it. The Beduins could easily trade for those, so even with their lack of forging, it would make sense.

I'd like re-state that everything I say is just a suggestion. I'm just very intrested in this project. You see, I'm a Byzantium addict. It's been a dream of mine to do a new version of Pythium with more Constantinople (Greek fire, Varangian Guards, Icons and sh*t) and less Hydras and overpowered priest mages. With your mod and this hypothetical mod of mine (if you ever finish this, I'll make it thought) we could re-enact the Byzantium wars. Heck, I even might a dip my toe inmap-making and make a map out of some image of Turk + Greece.

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

This should have all recruitable units apart from the assassin.

By how it seems to turn out in my head, this nation won't have too much standing power compared to many other nations, but has a relatively good magic diversity, decent raiders, and with djinn-summons and dervishes possibly a meaningful niche for a water bless - though I reckon both djinn and dervishes will die horribly from archers before you start using arrow fend and/or storm.

Next up I'll need to make heroes. I reckon Abdul Alhazred, Ali Baba (along with bandits!) and Sinbad atleast.

Alhazred will be an insane heretic S3D2B2 mage.
Ali Baba will be a bandit leader, nothing too special.
Sinbad will just be a sailing commander with bad event prevention.

EDIT: Alchemist is probably capital only. I think mystics will be sacred.

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

Looks great, I like the new sprites. The alchemists will be a useful tool for site searching/forging and the most likely source for the all important dwarven hammer.

The mystic should probably be sacred given the role that sufi's had in spreading islam in both Asia and Africa, not to mention that they were responsible for founding many a dervish lodge.

As for your physical heroes, are you thinking about giving them the CBM treatment?

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

Well, I just realized all priests have to be sacred anyway :)

What would that be? Highly increased stats?

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

Slightly increased stats, a minor magical item or two, and a secondary affliction causing attack. Enough to make them thugable in the same sense as a Sleeper, but hardly a super combatant.

Re: EA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (WIP)
 

Sounds fair. Better than having all the cool heroes just work as normal infantry shepherds.

Anyway, I put up all the work so far as a playable nation. Please give feedback on unit stats and prices.

I'll edit the first post too.

EDIT: For the sake of my sanity, the downloadable version will only be up at the first post

Re: MA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (Now version 0.1!)
 

I like the look - simple, clean, fits in with dom3.

I'd love to see camel cavalry. I think there are a few ways you could make them very buildable units - they could be camel archers with prec 11, composite bows and mapmove 3 (good precision because the camel can support a more stable mount for archery). They could have animal awe and thus be elephant counters - perhaps the smell drives away other animals. They could provide supplies to your units. They could have some other fun justification based on camel mythology ;] They could also have especially good riders, who pick the camel because of its status in their culture.

Re: MA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (Now version 0.1!)
 

Sounds like a good idea.

Here's a preliminary sprite. As far as I know the camel is a smaller animal than a horse in real life though, so the camel is far too big.

Re: MA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (Now version 0.1!)
 

Animal awe would be good on camels. In real life I believe they were effective against horses because of the smell. Unfortunately you can't make them good against cavalry in dom3, but you can at least make them good against elephants (and monkeys).

I also like the idea of the camel rider being elite.

Edit (elmokki posted while I was typing): Very nice camel!

Edit again: I think something funny has happened to the camel rider's legs. They are very small.

Re: MA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (Now version 0.1!)
 

Apparently an adult dromedary camel can be 2.15 meters from land to the top of the hump, and riding horses in general seem to be 1.6 meters from land to the start of their neck. The sprite size should actually be good enough.

I'll fix the legs once I come back from my night shift job where I'll be going in next 5 minutes.

The camel sprite is wasteland survival icon resized too 200% and smoothened out to not look so pixelated.

Re: MA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (Now version 0.1!)
 

Man. That's freaking clever. Never even gave a single thought for this.

Don't know if it means anything, but you got my respect. Those sprites look good, too.

Re: MA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (Now version 0.1!)
 

I'm glad you like the camel, I'm personally surprised how good it became. I didn't expect much.

Anyway, first post is updated with new image and mod with Camel Cavalry, Camel Archer and Camel in a few minutes. I don't know if I should make the camel fight by itself if the rider dies, I don't think they're that aggressive animals. I made the camel a seperate unit for a low level N-summon al-Nadim can summon with indies or pretender ;)


EDIT: How can you add line breaks to #summary, or will I have to find out the exact amount of times I'll have to press space bar?

The lancer (somewhat more armored cavalry with light lance) feels pretty useless unit now. Light lance isn't too awesome and the only advantanges it has compared to camel cavalry is really the first strike bonus, combat speed and price, while it completely loses on long term damage, strategic movement and survivability.

Also, I need to make a camel riding commander. A camel riding supreme vizier rainbow pretender sounds cool too, but there's really not much need for that

Next up: Hippo riding EA Machaka unit ;)

Re: MA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (Now version 0.1!)
 

I hope you won't mind, Burnsaber, that I used a sprite from Holy War with so little modification for ifrit. The sprite just was really good for this :)

Anyway, here's an ifrit and a marid. Both are very lowly members of their species' and there'll sure be stronger (and larger) djinnis.

They'll probably have 75% resistance to their own elements, possibly some fire resistance on marid (all djinni are supposed to be beings of smokeless fire afaik) and a weak fire shield on ifrit. I don't know about awe, but it's possibly. They'll both be flying of course.

Naturally, if or once there's more work on an EA arabic nation, those sprites will get priority.

Re: MA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (Now version 0.1!)
 

Njah. I don't mind. More like honored. But it's a quite cheap graphic you know? I just recolored a Mictlan priest into red and gave it the flames of an Agarthan Magma Child. I didn't even have to change the pose, I just drew the halberd on top of it.

Also, I remembered some graphics presented in the F&W thug mod. Perhaps they can be some sort of inspiration?

Here are some by Aezeal.

http://forum.shrapnelgames.com//show...35&postcount=6

Here is a one form me. The Torso probably could serve as part on a big efreet. It's recolor of a Mictlan summon (blue-skin + scorpion tail, forgot his name). Zlefin only used the silhoutte in his mod, so you can do pretty much anything with the pic.

http://forum.shrapnelgames.com//show...26&postcount=9

Re: MA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (Now version 0.1!)
 

Those Aezeal's sprites actually look more like genies in tales, which is pretty good. On the other hand if I go with the current look, that solarion of yours is a perfect match for a bigger ifrit.

The problem is I personally am not very interested in making a recruitable djinn-based nation, but would happily look into graphics. I need someone who is more interested in the game mechanical part of recruitable djinnis before I do many djinnis of my own - since the djinnis here should be the same that are recruitable in earlier era :)

Re: MA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (Now version 0.1!)
 

Well you could sorta have both. If I recall the Djinn stuff correctly, they're desripted both as tricksy conmen and masters of the elements. Sometimes they're really dumb and get tricked by humans.

Perhaps divide the attributes to two different Djinn? A tricksy wish granting one and "EFREET BURN!!! EFREET MAD!!" types of massive flmaing bulks of elemental muscle. The tricksy could be more effective mages with diverse paths while the dumb ones are thug/Sc chassises made incarnate with lots of power in single path.

Re: MA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (Now version 0.1!)
 

I updated the first post with spells to summon the two djinns and camels. Oh yeah, and I added a camel commander.

I'm not really happy with how ifrit and marid sprites look like. They're just too blue or red. I guess I'll remake them from a scratch later.

Anyway, I'm more or less off for the weekend and I'd really like to have someone actually comment the stats of the units while I'm gone. I bet they're completely out of balance.

Re: MA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (Now version 0.1!)
 

I played a test game using a duel bless strategy (astral, water) which works amazingly well with the Dervishes. However in doing so I noticed something that is extremely broken. Base scimitars are magical and have a length of 7. Somehow I don't think dervishes are carrying two swords longer than pikes into combat. All things considered Dervishes seem to be a very good recruit everywhere sacred, that synchronizes well with the air buffing spells and the capital only H3 priests. The basic archers are nice and cheap, and equipped with flaming arrow potential, and the elite infantry is very capable of holding a line.

Re: MA al-Nadim - The thousand and one nights (Now version 0.1!)
 

Thanks for input.

I'd say scimitars being length 7 and magical would be some kind of a problem with other mods not synchronizing with this one. I changed the ids today to ones that should work better. I mean, I just checked and they're damage 5, att 1, def 1, length 2

I'm afraid dervishes are too good for the price, but they should die rather easily in early game to about any type of archers. With robes as only armor it's really easy to get them killed to indies without a high air bless or buff spells. That said, storm and arrow fend will make them far more survivable. Dervishes might get a minor price increase, but in the end while they're better than serpent dancers of EA C'tis (two weapons, berserk), they aren't world breakingly better. Then again I'm afraid the prices aren't too well balanced on most units apart from the basic infantry :)

The elite infantry, Mubarizun, might become limited to capital only.

Camel troops' animal awe is also making me nerveous, though it is very situational.