MA: Al-Murrah: Desert Dwellers

[Wizzil]

DrPraetorious provides a rather nice discription, though may i add for game purposes they can be like berserkers fighting in a whirlwind like motion.

I'll get on with the mythological creatures:

Djinn: the basic type of otherworldy creature in middle eastern mythology, they can be taken in any direction and have many other "castes", though the basic djinn is usually considered as some sort of air spirit or tied to the air element generally.

Marid: Coastal Djinn, huge in size, usually cruel creatures that torture their prey by asking almost impossible riddles before eating them whole.

Efreet: Generally small djinn, their size may reach that of a human, very fiery in nature and destructive.

Selbouh: not related to the djinn, a sentient froglike creature with big eyes, usually they stalk their pray in rivers, skewering them with spears and dragging them into the bottom of the river to consume them.

Ghul: formerly they were human, but madness has destroyed their minds, they usually dig out graves and eat the corpses within them.

i haven't played much yet of the game to give the units roles, so i'll leave it to the author, seeing how djinns generally vary they can fit in pretty much everything (like for instance Ifreets as skirmisher type of units, firing flaming arrows and fighting with swords enchanted with fire), maybe have them conjured as some sort of national magic that depends on the school of magic you take.

[DrPraetorious]

I made an effort to incorporate Jinn and Efreet into some of dominions3's own unique mythology. Obviously these descriptions will have to be changed if they are not national summons for Abyssia, but I wanted your feedback on the general ideas.

On the stats for Jinn etc.:
* They are made from smokeless fire, so they are ethereal, and immune to fire damage.
* They have the ability to become invisible, maybe shape change, etc. - best compromise, give them glamour. Possibly flight, as well.
* Jinn derives from a term meaning something like "hidden", so give them stealth.
* They live on dust, and their mounts eat bones and dung (or was it the other way around?). Anyway, they don't need supplies.
* They are extremely long lived, at least a thousand years maxage - but not immortal.
* Solomon had an army of them by virtue of his ability to communicate with anything (or am I misreading this?) Anyway, the question of communication suggests that they require magic leadership (and thus are magic beings.)

The Abyssians are the children of Rhuax, the lord of Magma. So, I thought the Jinn should, by extension be the children of Catharsis (lord of smokeless fire) who becomes Anthrax, lord of bane fire, in dominions3's own internal mythology. The "good" jinn hide themselves from humans mainly out of fear and shame, they fight with more or less regular weapons, while the "bad" jinn, ifrit, marids, whatever you call them, followed their father into the underworld, and fight with blasts of banefire.

[Wizzil]

if this is directed at me, just one error, Solomon had the djinns becuase it was granted to him by god, his communication with non-humans came from his father King David (if i recall correctly).

Everything else sounds good and meshes well with the Dominions mythology imo.

[Starshine_Monarch]

What about the jinns' mounts? do they have any unusual characteristics? You said they were mentioned in the Koran, so I flipped through a copy they had at my school library, but I probably missed it.

Also, say I wanted to make the Dervish berserkers do something different when blessed, like some of Mictlan's units. I was thinking when blessed and wounded, they would start to attack faster, simulated by them transforming into a state with higher Attack and AP as well as giving them weapons with extra attacks (ie. making a weapon identical to a scimitar, but with 2 attacks rather than 1). If it is at all possible, how would I do this?

[DrPraetorious]

I saw some artwork depicting jinn riding around on sort-of cloud whale things. I don't know if that's a common depiction, but it looked cool. I'm having trouble finding it (mostly getting the dude from star wars I.)

I'm also having trouble finding the passage in question as well. It might talk about their animals insead of their mounts.

The wikipedia article says "animals" so maybe my recollection is wrong.

[Starshine_Monarch]

Edit: Nevermind, I was gonna ask for a link, but I just noticed you said you were having trouble. As far as I know Jar-Jar has little to do with jinn....

[Morkilus]

Just chiming in to say I'm very much looking forward to this mod. There does seem to be a lack of arabic stuff, which is a shame considering how much magic there is in the mythology. Alchemy should be a focus, as long as it's different from Arco's.