New Unit - Scythian Axmen

[Barkhorn1x]

At the .COM. Looks good but he appears to be missing his shield.

Barkhorn.

[hundurinn]

It's just a normal barbarian with an axe, can't say it's good. We have seen many barbarians over the last few weeks http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-inquisitive.gif and now I hope we will see something new.

[The_Emperor]

Quote[/b] (hundurinn @ May 24 2004,18:09)]It's just a normal barbarian with an axe, can't say it's good. We have seen many barbarians over the last few weeks http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-inquisitive.gif and now I hope we will see something new.
Ditto, too many barbarians.

Give us some cool Persian or Parthian units. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif

[hundurinn]

Exactly we want something else than barbarians all the time. We want some eastern factions units. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-jester.gif

[The Wizard]

And please correct the Parthian horse archer... that the Parthian lancer has a full aventail I can live with, but the dress and overall look of the Parthians is all wrong And chainmail on horse archers? http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-inquisitive.gif

But I like this unit, he looks good even though there weren't many Skythians on foot, never mind any Skythians left... they perished around 300 BC in one of the domino effects of the steppes. The Sarmatians took their place.

Hell, the Romans even called eastern Europe and northern Transcaucasia Sarmatia Maior and Sarmatia Minor respectively...

But hey, never mind that, give the Eastern barbarians some of these.



~Wiz http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-confused.gif

[CBR]

Hm why do I see some WW2 (looks like Call of Duty) picture there..


CBR

[biguth dickuth]

Quote[/b] ]Give us some cool Persian or Parthian units. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif
A persian unit could be strange as the persians are outside the timeline of the game.
However, there could be some persian units in the game, just for the historical battles.

[shingenmitch2]

hundurr --- Scythians are an eastern faction unit...

They were known for their cavalry, and archers, but since CA hasn't posted any archers or cav, i think we got one of the few Scythian footies.

They prolly should have gotten a little more creative with the soldier's accessories as the Scythians were noted for all the gold and jewelry they wore. He prolly should also have a tunic and some armor.


Wiz --
u are correct about the Saramatians, but the ancients continued to call (erroniously) any steppe cav people Scythians (and this continued up to the time of the huns) Of the steppe peeps, the Saramatians & Scythians were very closely related being Indo-Aryan, while the later Huns were most probably early proto-turks, and later the mongols were quite separate from the turks, though they had many allied/enslaved Turkic tribes under their banner.

BTW, what picture of the Parthian Lancers are you referring to?

[Spino]

Looks great. Glad to see the Scythian Axeman beat the Egyptian Bowmen with Pharaonic headgear. Close race though. I'm sure the Egyptian unit will win this week's poll handily.

What's with all the shirtless barbarian units? I expect the topless look from the Gauls & Britons (and to a lesser extent Germans) not the Scythians. This guy should have a equally decorative shirt to match those funky looking pajama-like trousers.

Can anyone provide some fashion oriented historical context on this one?

Seriously though, it seems that in terms of appearance, donning a shirt is what separates a low cost civilized unit from its barbarian counterpart in RTW. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/confused.gif

[shingenmitch2]

Scythian run-down off the top of my head...

Light Scythian troops would wear a tunic and trousers, probably with a Scythian cap (smilar to the fox-skin Thracian cap)

Heavier Scythian troops wore scale-mail shirts or composite curiass with lamilar-type plates.

They had splinted greaves (or bought Greek greaves)

Even footies would probably have a gorytos (bow case) and short bow.

They were known for their akinates (spelling might be off) short sword which was worn with a scabbard strapped to their thigh.

Cavalry might wear scale-mail chaps.

Their helmets were usually modified Greek helmets --- like a sawed off Corthinian, Illyrian or Attic helmet. They might have added an aventail to the back.

They liked gold torques, bangles and often wore a large ornamented pectoral (chest protector/necklace)

They might weild a battle axe, though different than what u see --- long thin 1-handed handle with thin bill designed for penetrating armor.

AFAIK virtually all the Scythians rode horses so they really didn't have foot soldiers per se. The Sindoi (spelling again) were the slave peoples who farmed and who paid tribute (and food) to the Scyths. They might provide foot soldiers if needed (basically they were peasants).

[The Wizard]

Quote[/b] (shingenmitch2 @ May 24 2004,18:27)]Wiz --
u are correct about the Saramatians, but the ancients continued to call (erroniously) any steppe cav people Scythians (and this continued up to the time of the huns) Of the steppe peeps, the Saramatians & Scythians were very closely related being Indo-Aryan, while the later Huns were most probably early proto-turks, and later the mongols were quite separate from the turks, though they had many allied/enslaved Turkic tribes under their banner.

BTW, what picture of the Parthian Lancers are you referring to?
The RTW 'cataphracts' (lancers as I call them, which would be the correct term as 'cataphracts' is too wide a term to designate a single unit) have been the same since TC Tigranocerta...

There, their faces were covered by full mail aventails, ála late Sassanian clibanarii, or East Roman/Byzantine clibanarii. Also, the lances seem just a tad too short -- the kontos was a bit longer in my experience, but that might be my imagination speaking.

All sources show Parthian lancers wearing aventails of lamellar or chain, covering the neck and ears. Only one rock carving shows a Parthian lancer with full aventail, but this carving is from the 3rd century AD... so yeah.

And about the Greeks calling steppe peoples Skythians -- the Byzantines had a mercenary corps called Skythikon. 'Nuff said http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/bigthumb.gif



~Wiz

[hundurinn]

It would be great to see some horse units esspacially Parthians units. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wacko.gif

[Catiline]

yopu have to wonder how someone from the Russian steppes becomes particularly adept at hiding in forests, barbarian or not...

[The Wizard]

BTW, about usual Skythian garment...

Yes they had chaps, but weren't most of these leather? The first armoured cavalry appeared in the 8th century BC, when the Massagetae were sent into a domino movement (sending the Royal Skythians west), who developed armoured cavalry after that.

Also, weren't most Skythians - save for these armoured horsemen - dressed in the usual colorful Skythian outfits?



~Wiz

[shingenmitch2]

Wiz --

I think for the "light archer cav" the chaps would be just leather, but I recall that their was lamilar/scale chaps real early on.

and yes, the predominance of cavalry would be of the "light" variety and wearing just bright colored clothes and perhaps having a small shield slung round their shoulder.

I think the Saramatians of 300s B.C. had the advantage of the kontos/lance and that is what brought about their ascendancy on the steppe. (I also wonder if their might not have been some sort of saddle revolution going on here with the 4-prong [so-called celtic] saddle conferring a distict advantage upon the Saramatians).

[The_Emperor]

Its also amazing they are experts at hiding in forests with those trousers http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-jester.gif

[The Wizard]

Well, the Skythians, especially the ones with more infantry (plowing Skythians and their slightly more northern cousins), lived to the north of the Danube and around the Don...

Plenty of forests there methinks. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif



~Wiz

[Aymar de Bois Mauri]

Quote[/b] (shingenmitch2 @ May 24 2004,12:56)]Scythian run-down off the top of my head...

Light Scythian troops would wear a tunic and trousers, probably with a Scythian cap (smilar to the fox-skin Thracian cap)

Heavier Scythian troops wore scale-mail shirts or composite curiass with lamilar-type plates.

They had splinted greaves (or bought Greek greaves)

Even footies would probably have a gorytos (bow case) and short bow.

They were known for their akinates (spelling might be off) short sword which was worn with a scabbard strapped to their thigh.

Cavalry might wear scale-mail chaps.

Their helmets were usually modified Greek helmets --- like a sawed off Corthinian, Illyrian or Attic helmet. They might have added an aventail to the back.

They liked gold torques, bangles and often wore a large ornamented pectoral (chest protector/necklace)

They might weild a battle axe, though different than what u see --- long thin 1-handed handle with thin bill designed for penetrating armor.

AFAIK virtually all the Scythians rode horses so they really didn't have foot soldiers per se. The Sindoi (spelling again) were the slave peoples who farmed and who paid tribute (and food) to the Scyths. They might provide foot soldiers if needed (basically they were peasants).
Awesome description, Lord Shing http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-2thumbsup.gif

[Aymar de Bois Mauri]

Quote[/b] (Catiline @ May 24 2004,13:19)]yopu have to wonder how someone from the Russian steppes becomes particularly adept at hiding in forests, barbarian or not...
LOL http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-jester.gif Someone mentioned it is going to be very difficult to fight Barbarians in RTW. We won't see ANY of them.

[Colovion]

Quote[/b] ]Its also amazing they are experts at hiding in forests with those trousers



Hah - give him some green/brown trousers and he's damn near invisible http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif

[Nowake]

Quote[/b] (Catiline @ May 24 2004,21:19)]yopu have to wonder how someone from the Russian steppes becomes particularly adept at hiding in forests, barbarian or not...
Catiline, I was going to say the same thing.


Though, it seems it doesn't matter the people who hide, but the unit. The light units, barbarian units usually, have an advantage when hiding in front of the legionary manipulii.

[biguth dickuth]

I personally think that they are falling straight into the trap of:
non-roman-or-greek = barbarian = big, naked, fierce guy

Most of the so-called barbarians' units so far are naked, expert at hiding in forest e.t.c.
It seems to me they will end up being useful only in forest ambushes and that in an open-plain fight they will be breakfast to the uber-legionaires.
Perhaps, my estimations are too pessimistic but i really don't like the presentation of some units.

Sure, the scythian axemen look "cool" but some people in this forum have already stated lots of things that are wrong with them. Just read the post that shingenmitch2 wrote...
I would be glad if CA would use all the historical information provided to them (by fans here and by other sources) and not invent generic barbarian units out of their own minds.

Having a lot of work to do on the game is not an excuse for not taking the fans' requests for accuracy seriously. It is, in fact, because of all this work that they have done on the game that they should try and make it worth the strain.

[Rosacrux]

Biguth Dikuth (you never told me where Incontinentia Buttocks hides these days, you know)

We've been through this, over and over and over again. CA has it's strategy - appeal to the mass market of the socially, linguistically and intellectually challenged console-loving 12year olds. Locked factions, fantasy units, flaming pigs, rabid dogs, weiling sheilas, panoramix-like druids, pink flamingos, dambo the elephant, uruk-hi, Frodo Baggins and the likes, are extremely convincing as an indication for this. Those kids are the mass audience CA (Activision) are after and they won't let a bunch of history buffs go in their way.


I have learned to live with it, even make fun of it - and the crapload of right-off-CA-belly, semi-or-pure-fantasy freak-units they'll ship with the game - and when I get my hands on the game join the community efforts to create something less moron... errr... creative and instead closer to reality http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/rolleyes.gif

[Knight_Yellow]

Ill say it again:

1% (if that) of TW players actualy care about realism to the point of units armour or the correct names or wether orn not flaming pigs were actualy used.

You are sadly deluded if you think CA should care about 1% of their customers as apposed to the other 99%

They have 2 options.

Make it uber acurate delaying the game another year and sell 15 copies.

or make it like previous total war games and sell millins of copies.

[Aymar de Bois Mauri]

Quote[/b] (Rosacrux @ May 25 2004,07:35)]Biguth Dikuth (you never told me where Incontinentia Buttocks hides these days, you know)

We've been through this, over and over and over again. CA has it's strategy - appeal to the mass market of the socially, linguistically and intellectually challenged console-loving 12year olds. Locked factions, fantasy units, flaming pigs, rabid dogs, weiling sheilas, panoramix-like druids, pink flamingos, dambo the elephant, uruk-hi, Frodo Baggins and the likes, are extremely convincing as an indication for this. Those kids are the mass audience CA (Activision) are after and they won't let a bunch of history buffs go in their way.


I have learned to live with it, even make fun of it - and the crapload of right-off-CA-belly, semi-or-pure-fantasy freak-units they'll ship with the game - and when I get my hands on the game join the community efforts to create something less moron... errr... creative and instead closer to reality http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/rolleyes.gif
Motion aproved http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-2thumbsup.gif

[Colovion]

It's probably tough for them if you think about it - here they are making a game, it's amazing as everyone is saying. However, their most dedicated and zealous fans are not liking what they are doing with the game. THese are the fans that will be around for a while and won't just plop the money down and fiddle with SP for a few weeks before moving on to something else (casual gamers). Not to say there's anything wrong with that kind of gaming, but CA knows where the money is, even though it might hurt some of their loyalists.... *ching ching*

[Rosacrux]

Quote[/b] (Knight_Yellow @ May 25 2004,07:51)]Ill say it again:

1% (if that) of TW players actualy care about realism to the point of units armour or the correct names or wether orn not flaming pigs were actualy used.

You are sadly deluded if you think CA should care about 1% of their customers as apposed to the other 99%

They have 2 options.

Make it uber acurate delaying the game another year and sell 15 copies.

or make it like previous total war games and sell millins of copies.
now, don't you think you are acting in a rather tongue-in-cheeck manner here? Have you concluded any kind of market research and know for a given that 99% of MTW-STW gamers are the way you describe them? Or are you just pulling numbers out of your stomach?

STW-MTW got a massive audience of history buffs and players that care (more or less) for the accuracy as well as the fun part. Of course RTW wishes to appeal to a much larger audience, so your... errr... calculations might not be very off (if this game turns out to be as succesful as anticipated). But for the time being I wouldn't call 99% of the MTW-STW fans that way, no sir.

And unless they have a massive marketing dept that feeds them with tons of opinion polls and heaps of market researches, CA should value the few MTW forums (like the Org) as their best sources for customer feedback. If they don't... their loss.

[Sir Moody]

ros the org patrons represent the Hardcore fans - we are those chosen few who take the STW and MTW to the next level and keep at it - the majority of sales do not go to us they go to casual gamers who will play for a week/month and then go onto the next game they see to them historical accuracy is a turn off not turn on as it makes it a whole more difficult - just let CA make the game and then we the chosen few can "improve" upon it

[Rosacrux]

I wouldn't disagree, but saying "the majority of the sales goes to casual gamers" is rather different than stating out of the blue that "only 1% of the gamers care for accuracy at all".

Sure we are going to mod the heck out of it, but a historically accurate game would be more than just entertaining - it would be a bloody masterpiece. And it doesn't have to become "boring" or "geeky" to be that way - historical accurate units can (and in most occassions are) far more "cooler" http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/rolleyes.gif than the freaks CA creative dept has come up with.

If you ask me, it's just lazines. They didn't care doing much research, even reading the research we've done for them. They just believe "they know better" and proceed on creating one abomination after another.

The heck with it. I'll buy the game anyway. I'll even preorder it. But it could be soooo much better if they'd listen to us... http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/tongue.gif

[Big King Sanctaphrax]

Quote[/b] (Knight_Yellow @ May 25 2004,13:51)]Ill say it again:

1% (if that) of TW players actualy care about realism to the point of units armour or the correct names or wether orn not flaming pigs were actualy used.

You are sadly deluded if you think CA should care about 1% of their customers as apposed to the other 99%

They have 2 options.

Make it uber acurate delaying the game another year and sell 15 copies.

or make it like previous total war games and sell millins of copies.
This arguement is flawed-why would historically accurate units cause sales to drop?

[Trax]

People, who don´t care about history isn´t going to buy this quite complicated combination of turn based empire building and real time wargame anyway. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/rolleyes.gif

[shingenmitch2]

Obviously i think accuracy can only help the game and as long as the game play is fun and EASY TO USE, the other details will scare no-one off from buying it.

I think there is confusion between "historical accuracy" and "easy to play." Too often historical games are ponderous and complicated to play and this is what scares off the Warcraft crowd, not the accuracy and detail of the units.

-------------------

I do think there is an unfortunate trend in the units and cultures to fall into the "Roman/Greek" vision of the "less civilized" peoples as barbarians. The fact that CA is calling Germans or Gauls "barbarians" only reinforces the "mob of stupid wild men" stereotype that will rob these factions of a richness that they should have. It also tips the designer's hand as to how they are thinking about them as they are designing them.

The Scyths might not have had great cities, but they were an absolutely fascinating people who were highly intelligent. Their art is some of the finest in antiquity. It would be a shame if their faction wasn't treated with the same respect and detail as that of Greece, Rome or Carthage. The same goes for the Celts & Thracians.

---------------

Back to the main topic of this thread, the Scythian axeman. In terms of depiction, I think the artwork is okay. There still could have been more done to really capture the feel of the Scyths.

In terms of the unit's description, I will give a bit of a thumbs down because as Biguth has pointed out there seems to be a bad trend starting with the "Barbarian" units.

[The Wizard]

Quote[/b] (Nowake @ May 25 2004,07:50)]
Quote[/b] (Catiline @ May 24 2004,21:19)]yopu have to wonder how someone from the Russian steppes becomes particularly adept at hiding in forests, barbarian or not...
Catiline, I was going to say the same thing.


Though, it seems it doesn't matter the people who hide, but the unit. The light units, barbarian units usually, have an advantage when hiding in front of the legionary manipulii.
Gah - did nobody read my damn post? The only Skythians that had infantry were the sedentary plowing Skythians - who lived in modern-day Bulgaria, Romania and Moldavia. Plenty of forests there. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/rolleyes.gif



~Wiz

[Spino]

Quote[/b] (The Wizard @ May 25 2004,10:59)]
Quote[/b] (Nowake @ May 25 2004,07:50)]
Quote[/b] (Catiline @ May 24 2004,21:19)]yopu have to wonder how someone from the Russian steppes becomes particularly adept at hiding in forests, barbarian or not...
Catiline, I was going to say the same thing.


Though, it seems it doesn't matter the people who hide, but the unit. The light units, barbarian units usually, have an advantage when hiding in front of the legionary manipulii.
Gah - did nobody read my damn post? The only Skythians that had infantry were the sedentary plowing Skythians - who lived in modern-day Bulgaria, Romania and Moldavia. Plenty of forests there. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/rolleyes.gif



~Wiz
Your info is appreciated Wiz but CA needs to give the Scythians a few capable infantry units otherwise they would be hard pressed to threaten anyone in the single player campaign and would be next to useless in multiplayer games. Slave/serf peasantry armed with pointy sticks aren't going to do squat against western civilized and barbarian infantry.

[The Wizard]

Plowing Skythians - being sedentary and all - probably had a reasonable amount of relatively good infantry, looking at such neighbors as the Dacians or Thracians.



~Wiz

[shingenmitch2]

Hi Wiz,

The so-called "Scyth-farmers" are an interesting lot. They have been identified with the Chernoles culture who were the precursors to modern slavs.

The Scyths called these farmers the slave peoples, Syndoi (sindoi? something like that) and I don't believe they would ever have considered them part of any of the major Scyth tribes (Sacae, Dahae, Massagetae, Issedones). I wonder if they were the remnants of those Cimmerians who didn't flee the region when the Scyths swept in -- and thus their status as slave peoples.

Regardless of their ethinc origins, they were used as foot troops by the Scyths. So in game terms, I suppose they would be like the Korean footies we got with the Mongols in MI.

Personally, I'm not sure if Scyths need foot troops for the game. An all cav faction would be quite interesting. In MI it seemed to me that the Mongol foot troops only slowed those armies down and kinda tied the cav to whereever the foot troops were.

[biguth dickuth]

Quote[/b] ]Biguth Dikuth (you never told me where Incontinentia Buttocks hides these days, you know)

I won't be kind enough to uncover such a delicate information... http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif


Quote[/b] ]We've been through this, over and over and over again.
Well, i know and i'm trying to live with it Sometimes, however, i just can't help it and start whining about it.
Since our little debate with CA doesn't seem to get us anywhere, i have to agree with you... long live the mods


Quote[/b] ]Sure we are going to mod the heck out of it, but a historically accurate game would be more than just entertaining - it would be a bloody masterpiece. And it doesn't have to become "boring" or "geeky" to be that way - historical accurate units can (and in most occassions are) far more "cooler" than the freaks CA creative dept has come up with.

If you ask me, it's just lazines. They didn't care doing much research, even reading the research we've done for them. They just believe "they know better" and proceed on creating one abomination after another.

Good points there

Quote[/b] ]Obviously i think accuracy can only help the game and as long as the game play is fun and EASY TO USE, the other details will scare no-one off from buying it.

I think there is confusion between "historical accuracy" and "easy to play." Too often historical games are ponderous and complicated to play and this is what scares off the Warcraft crowd, not the accuracy and detail of the units.

-------------------

I do think there is an unfortunate trend in the units and cultures to fall into the "Roman/Greek" vision of the "less civilized" peoples as barbarians. The fact that CA is calling Germans or Gauls "barbarians" only reinforces the "mob of stupid wild men" stereotype that will rob these factions of a richness that they should have. It also tips the designer's hand as to how they are thinking about them as they are designing them.

The Scyths might not have had great cities, but they were an absolutely fascinating people who were highly intelligent. Their art is some of the finest in antiquity. It would be a shame if their faction wasn't treated with the same respect and detail as that of Greece, Rome or Carthage. The same goes for the Celts & Thracians.

This is exactly what i think too

[Aymar de Bois Mauri]

Quote[/b] (Rosacrux @ May 25 2004,08:04)]
Quote[/b] (Knight_Yellow @ May 25 2004,07:51)]Ill say it again:

1% (if that) of TW players actualy care about realism to the point of units armour or the correct names or wether orn not flaming pigs were actualy used.

You are sadly deluded if you think CA should care about 1% of their customers as apposed to the other 99%

They have 2 options.

Make it uber acurate delaying the game another year and sell 15 copies.

or make it like previous total war games and sell millins of copies.
now, don't you think you are acting in a rather tongue-in-cheeck manner here? Have you concluded any kind of market research and know for a given that 99% of MTW-STW gamers are the way you describe them? Or are you just pulling numbers out of your stomach?

STW-MTW got a massive audience of history buffs and players that care (more or less) for the accuracy as well as the fun part. Of course RTW wishes to appeal to a much larger audience, so your... errr... calculations might not be very off (if this game turns out to be as succesful as anticipated). But for the time being I wouldn't call 99% of the MTW-STW fans that way, no sir.

And unless they have a massive marketing dept that feeds them with tons of opinion polls and heaps of market researches, CA should value the few MTW forums (like the Org) as their best sources for customer feedback. If they don't... their loss.
Yes. KY is being far and away too extreme on his "market study". As I've said previously, a lot of their intended target will prefer those more fantastical-related games, just for the sake of colorfull themes and plots. Those of them that will jump on RTW's bandwagon, even if unaquainted with History, will prefer to know that the game is accurate, because if not, it wouldn't be RomeTW, but just another Fantasy game...

[Aymar de Bois Mauri]

Quote[/b] (Rosacrux @ May 25 2004,08:22)]I wouldn't disagree, but saying "the majority of the sales goes to casual gamers" is rather different than stating out of the blue that "only 1% of the gamers care for accuracy at all".

Sure we are going to mod the heck out of it, but a historically accurate game would be more than just entertaining - it would be a bloody masterpiece. And it doesn't have to become "boring" or "geeky" to be that way - historical accurate units can (and in most occassions are) far more "cooler" http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/rolleyes.gif than the freaks CA creative dept has come up with.

If you ask me, it's just lazines. They didn't care doing much research, even reading the research we've done for them. They just believe "they know better" and proceed on creating one abomination after another.

The heck with it. I'll buy the game anyway. I'll even preorder it. But it could be soooo much better if they'd listen to us... http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/tongue.gif
Yes http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-2thumbsup.gif GREAT post, Rosacrux http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-2thumbsup.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/ht_bow.gif

[Aymar de Bois Mauri]

Quote[/b] (shingenmitch2 @ May 25 2004,08:53)]Obviously i think accuracy can only help the game and as long as the game play is fun and EASY TO USE, the other details will scare no-one off from buying it.

I think there is confusion between "historical accuracy" and "easy to play." Too often historical games are ponderous and complicated to play and this is what scares off the Warcraft crowd, not the accuracy and detail of the units.

-------------------

I do think there is an unfortunate trend in the units and cultures to fall into the "Roman/Greek" vision of the "less civilized" peoples as barbarians. The fact that CA is calling Germans or Gauls "barbarians" only reinforces the "mob of stupid wild men" stereotype that will rob these factions of a richness that they should have. It also tips the designer's hand as to how they are thinking about them as they are designing them.

The Scyths might not have had great cities, but they were an absolutely fascinating people who were highly intelligent. Their art is some of the finest in antiquity. It would be a shame if their faction wasn't treated with the same respect and detail as that of Greece, Rome or Carthage. The same goes for the Celts & Thracians.

---------------

Back to the main topic of this thread, the Scythian axeman. In terms of depiction, I think the artwork is okay. There still could have been more done to really capture the feel of the Scyths.

In terms of the unit's description, I will give a bit of a thumbs down because as Biguth has pointed out there seems to be a bad trend starting with the "Barbarian" units.
Great point about the "Barbarian"-mania ground rule. Like Rosacrux said, they are being lazy in their research, as well as thinking, wrongfully, that historical accuracy is contradictory to fun and playability, when clearly it is not.

[Nowake]

Gah - did nobody read my damn post? The only Skythians that had infantry were the sedentary plowing Skythians - who lived in modern-day Bulgaria, Romania and Moldavia. Plenty of forests there.


Not quite so many Wizz. The parts from Bulgaria, Romania and Moldavia inhabited by the scyths were the eastern parts, meaning Dobrogea and Basarabia. The first had few forests as it was the territory of a number of greek states who really deforested the area; and Basarabia was almost a steppe region also.

Plowing Skythians - being sedentary and all - probably had a reasonable amount of relatively good infantry, looking at such neighbors as the Dacians or Thracians.

Well, the dacians included scythians in their rank only as cavalry, and after that the sarmatians. None of these seems to have had an acceptable infantry.

I wonder if they were the remnants of those Cimmerians who didn't flee the region when the Scyths swept in -- and thus their status as slave peoples.

mitch, the cimmerians had a similar army composition as the scyths. when they invaded Asia Minor around 700 BC, they were depicted as warbands of horseraiders, their mobility being a key factor in their succes.


The problem of this unit will probably be that it has no use. It's dissapointing that the first scythian unit is so unrepresentative.

[longjohn2]

If the Scyths ever decide to invade anywhere that doesn't consist entirely of flat plains, then they'e going to find some infantry useful.

[Nowake]

http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-book2.gif

But maybe this is why they never managed to do it? http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-2thumbsup.gif Anyway, the dacian dracones always kept them at bay.

[The_Emperor]

Quote[/b] (longjohn2 @ May 27 2004,09:26)]If the Scyths ever decide to invade anywhere that doesn't consist entirely of flat plains, then they'e going to find some infantry useful.
Sounds like they have been included for the sake of rounding out the army...

[Aymar de Bois Mauri]

Quote[/b] (The_Emperor @ May 27 2004,04:34)]
Quote[/b] (longjohn2 @ May 27 2004,09:26)]If the Scyths ever decide to invade anywhere that doesn't consist entirely of flat plains, then they'e going to find some infantry useful.
Sounds like they have been included for the sake of rounding out the army...
Yeap. That should be the reason for it.

[The Wizard]

They shouldn't be anything big - but they certainly existed.



~Wiz

[shingenmitch2]

"They shouldn't be anything big..."

I gotta disagree (well sorta) as the Scyths were being replaced by this time-period by the Sarmations.

But the steppe peoples in general should be big. They had a huge impact on the Black Sea region and all of Messopotamia (Iraq, Iran, Afgahnistan, and sometimes as far as Palestine). The reason more peeps don't think they should be big is the focus of Western history which taught only about Rome, Greece and the west (i.e. Gauls/Germans -- sometimes Persia or Carthage.) The Russian steppe gets short-changed by historians way too much (this is also partly due to the fact the steppe peoples didn't write much, and thus left a smaller legacy to easily draw upon.)

[The Wizard]

I meant the infantry of the Skythians mitch... the cavalry should be pretty big for Sarmatians and other Skythian tribes (Parthians come to mind... http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif). I wasn't talking about some bullsh*t of Romans being the most important...

The peoples of the east should of course be big My favorite history is eastern, of its peoples I know the most And the Orient was one of the most interesting battlegrounds of RTW's timespan



~Wiz

[shingenmitch2]

well then http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/cheers.gif

[Oleander Ardens]

finally I managed to get a look upon this unit...

I agree mostly with the analyzes by shingenmitch - Scythian/Sarmantian art is so welldocumentated, as scythian cloths weapons and culture in general that some might think that a more "scythian/sarmantian" look might have been possible.

Funny enough that there is a Sarmantian tribe famous for hiding skillfully to hunt - more to come.

[Dead Moroz]

DON'T BELIEVE CA IT'S NOT SCYTHIAN UNIT http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/angry.gif

This unit do not looks like Scythian but rather like Gaul.
- Very strange helmet.
- Strange rings on hands.
- Big laced shoes that Scythians never wore.
- Rather not-Scythian axe. Scythians had more narrow axes (like on this picture (http://grants.rsu.ru/osi/Don_NC/Ancient/Earliron/Skif/Skifseki.jpg) ).
- He shouldn't be naked. Images of naked Scythians are very rare in ancient art. They are always clothed on battle scenes.
- Scythians were not experts at hiding in forests. Where did CA saw forests in Ukrainian steppes? Several bushes are not yet a wood. Scythians could be "Experts at Hiding in Steppes" (remember the story of Darius's campaign http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif ).

There are pics of real Scythian warriors:

http://grants.rsu.ru/osi/Don_NC/Ancient/Earliron/Greece/SkifGr/Grebsol1.jpg http://grants.rsu.ru/osi/Don_NC/Ancient/Earliron/Greece/SkifGr/Grebsol3.jpg http://vert.kiev.ua/articles/320/images/skif.jpg
http://www.ruslan-com.ru/zotov/scyth1.jpg
http://www.ruslan-com.ru/zotov/scyth2.gif http://www.ruslan-com.ru/zotov/scyth3.jpg