And Now the Time has Come my Friends to Think of Many Things!

I haven't authored a thread in some time.
This is partly because I am packing my house in preparation for a move, partly for my participation in the Soft Sodium biQarbonate council, (Which I must of course advertise to all, even if you only serve as an audience!), and partly because I have been enjoying your latest version of E.B.

I am attempting to construct a Cassian Kingdom, and deciding on which shore on the northern coast of Europe will be the centre of a fast, decisive 'D' Day.
But I have some questions to ask, and considering they are not large enough to create a thread around each one, I thought I would combine them with many other things here.

Firstly I will say I have noticed a pattern here, where at the beginning of a release, complaints are made on several obvious bugs.
The reporters of these problems are well aware of the efforts of the developing team, yet they are disappointed by what they have encountered.
So, no doubt with a feeling of self-percieved, rude ignorance, which is justified depending on perspective, they report it here.

Now there are some who have done this in a truly insulting manner.
But there are others who have queried and gestured most politely, and appeared as helpfully as they could.
And many times these members were met with harsh returns by developers who, whether irritated for previous insults or not, replied with comments that were very selfish in themselves, and too expectant.

To me, it was a shameless way to attempt to heap guilt upon those who wanted only to perfect this mod as much as possible.
And perfection, or a position as near to is as can be achieved, is the objective of the Europa Barbarorum team.

Yes, this mod is grand, worthy of payment and brilliantly studied.
But the praise that it recieves will be invalid and dull if it is sought and demanded too readily by the developing team.


And you do all know that I am a supporter of this mod, and that I enjoy it as much as the most avid member, so I try to radiate it's entertainment to others especially through roleplay in that respective forum.
But to play the part of neutrality, in previous arguments on the respect or disrepect shown by complaining members - both sides were at times far too aggressive towards their own colleagues.

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Secondly, I will ask my questions regarding gameplay:

Has anyone ever experienced, with or without the addition of BI.exe, the Cassian faction launching a naval assault on the continent?

How do you use spies effectively to create anti-government movements in other cities?
(My own spy can bring them to rebellion, but on one turn the public order stands at 20%, then immediately following it is 140% and I am thrown out within the next 3 turns)

Are there going to be new models created for the stone projectors?

Will the onagers that kick in the manner of an ass be returned to Romanae in later stages of the game - in later versions?

In several faction progression reports I have seen the Chremonidean League in control of the Crimean peninsula, Syrakousai and Kyrene.
Does the faction itself aim for these places by naval warfare, or is it simply rebellion?

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Thirdly, I ask for slight assistance from mostly avid Romani players.

I am in my Classical studies learning Latin by myself.
This, although seen by many of my family members as a very impossible task, has been very possible.
From a university in Texas I have found lessons in the language, and have begun to learn many of the basic inflections and memorised many verses:

Cvm hostes adessent, pro se qvisqve in vrbem, ex agris demigrant, vrbem ipsam saepivnt praesidiis.
When enemies appeared, for self everyone in city, from fields withdrew, city itself surrounded with guards.

Salvs popvlis svprema est lex.
Welfare people supreme as a law.

In learning the inflections, when I first downloaded your mod, I read your subtitle, "Qvisqve est barbarvs alio!", as, "Everone is a barbarian sometimes!".
Both understandings I think are truthful!
I have found it a most joyful and mentally distressing language to learn, it is the first I have attempted to understand, and in doing it alone with many sheets of paper not only have I a true written challenge for the first time in my life, but I also have found that I have a talent in being a linguist.

While I don't intend to become a great multi-linguist, I would like to learn Latin and Classical greek.

So my inquiry here is are there any very helpful and diverse lessons online that I may find?
These lessons from the university of Texas are very easy to understand, and there is a small, depleted dictionary in addition.
I am determined to learn, and I was curious to see if anyone here could offer me a place upon the internet I could continue learning.

I have already found many libraries which house great amounts of classical work - I recommend to everyone here these works:
On the Art of Horsemanship - Xenophon
An Apology - "
On Youth and Old Age, On Life and Death, On Breathing - Aristotle
Rhetoric - "
The Gallic, Civil, Alexandrian, African and Spanish Wars - Caius Caesar (Or one of his lieutenants
The Annals - Tacitus
The Histories - Tacitus

These are the most informative and most entertaining I have read this far, the first I mentioned here by Aristotle, is the product of his faculty's attempt to find the bodily organ which houses the soul.
Everything he writes is very well proven in most cases, and though when reading the first paragraphs you may be cynical of his beliefs, you may have your mind changed.
The Rhetoric is greatly important for anyone who wishes to improve their skills in persuasion on any scale, and should be included in basic schooling!

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This is enough to encompass the topic of one thread, and is most of what I have to address to and ask of this forum.
And I thank all that reply and comment.

Some interesting queries Glenn.

I fear that many who may have answered these questions have been driven away by the attitudes of others.

I must admit that the team seems a little defensive at times, but they have every right, as I'm sure you know.

As has been said countless times, EB is a labour of love. For us, the fans, to expect such things shows one to what great lengths the team have gone to accomodate fans in the past....so much so that fans now expect this as if it were a sequel to a game created by a company which actually pays it's game designers for their labours, and spends millions on advertising.

Fans must remember that this isn't so. Khelvan long ago could have said 'screw it, it's too much work for not enough gain', and he would have been justified in doing so, as it is an enormous amount of work.

So now, as we continue to play Rome 3 years after it's entertaining shelf-life, with only the EB team to thank, perhaps many should do well to remember that they owe us nothing, yet they continue to produce and toil in the salt mines, as it were.

For these reasons, not only do I agree with some reactions, but I think several were simply too nice. Fans need to learn their place. This is not a game we're shelling out sixty bucks for....it's free, and, quite frankly, they don't have to listen to us, let alone help us. Yet several continue to do so, and for that I am forever grateful.

Bootsiuv

Assorted points:

"Cvm hostes adessent, pro se qvisqve in vrbem, ex agris demigrant, vrbem ipsam saepivnt praesidiis."
-- When the enemies were at hand, for their own sake everyone went into the city from the fields, (and) they encircled the city itself with a garrison.

"Salus populis suprema est lex."
-- For groups of people, safety is the supreme law. (The fact that "populis" is in the dative plural makes this fairly clunky. I would prefer changing it to "Salus populi lex suprema est", both for "better" Latin and to get the genitive singular, "populi").

And, of course, "Qvisqve est barbarvs alio!"
-- Everyone is a barbarian to someone. (That is, no matter who you are, there is somebody who considers you a barbarian).

Sorry, I'm a bit of a Latin snob.

If you want to put some serious effort into independently learning Latin, I'd recommend the introductory book by Moreland & Fleischer. You can almost certainly get it off of Amazon, and it's very well done. I would recommend the books I used to learn Greek to you as well, but I wasn't at all impressed with them.

To supplement your list of works, I'd like to add some.

Xenophon - The Anabasis / the Persian Expedition.
Thucydides - Histories (of the Peloponnesian War).
Herodotus - History

And for less military-oriented, but still fun, classics:

Cicero - Anything, really. I've read his speeches against Verro and Cataline, as well as the Pro Caelio, all in Latin. He's very fun.
Plato - Republic (or at least Book I -- Socrates is hilarious)
Chariton - Callirhoe (warning: The main male character is a wuss.)
Achilles Tatius - Leucippe and Chaireas

And, of course, the obvious ones, like Homer and Virgil.

Cheers.

Thank you, Walker of the Land, for your suggestions.
You are not a snob, you are most probably like myself, a perfectionist.
And if I were to see someone riding or conducting their horse in the Classical Art in a way that is displeasing or corruptive to my interest, I would correct them no less than you have done so in my Latin.

Though I remind you that I memorised the verses I mentioned, and I did not write or change them for myself.
Popvlis was a spelling error, I scold myself for that!
But you have addressed me in the matters of Latin that spur me the most, the dative, accusatory, possessive, imperative, ablative, indirect and directive forms - and yet their own many cousins, are so numerous that I must gather as many lessons and writings as possible.
The first thing I must learn is how to read, write and finally speak Latin.
This is why I dare not conjure any Latin sentences of my own, through fear I would speak in multiple tenses.

Can you give me the title of this book?
Or better still refer to me Lessons that are written and available online?
Even, if there are some in existence which is quite certain, could you provide me with Latin texts that I might combine with my current lessons to learn sentence structure more diversely?

I notice also that the way you have translated the verses I wrote was not at all different in meaning, but more understandable in English.
Or does "Adessent" truly mean "At hand", because I was taught it meant appeared.
This is why I said, welfare people supreme as a law, because I was trying to show how I am told Latin is written, based on emotion and impression - which makes for very slow reading!
I hope I am right in this, another example I mean is by the line:

"Arma virvmqve cano, Troiae qvi primvs ab oris"
"Arms and men I sing, Troy who first from came", is how I was taught to understand it, but then you would in English translate,
"I sing of the arms and of the men, who first came from Troy".

I am greatly enthusiastic in the learning of this, and if successful then I will attempt Classical Greek.

Finally on the subject of Latin, what incorrection did I make in interpreting "Qvisqve est barbarvs alio!" as Everyone is a barbarian sometimes?
What would 'alio' become in that sense?

Thank you also for your list of Classics, I found a large list of authors, Euripides, Simonedes, Pliny, Isocrates, Livy!
And so many things to read between all of them that I found it hard to choose, I take three different works at a time and lavish in them all before moving on!
Xenophon I was introduced to by Alois Podhajsky, Director of the Spanish Riding School from 1940 to 1966, who died in 1973.
(Let it be known here I have no greater respect for anyone in our recent history, equal to this respect however is George S. Patton Jr.).
And after reading his treatise on the horse and on cavalry, I found him very interesting in many other subjects.

The other authors you have mentioned, like Thucydides, I am yet to read from, since I have been enveloped by Aristotle's theories and have determined to read all of his works before moving further on the list!



But thank you for this chance to talk about my interests in literacy!
The classics seem to be used on here as a liscense-to-kill in discussions, which is partly why I deter from mentioning them and partly why I don't enter into the more prolonged tug-o'-wars here.



Thank you again Land Walker, I will add those you have mentioned, especially Cicero, as priorities in reading.
Though I had planned on attending many of the biographies written by Plutarch, that he wrote of Caius Caesar is foremost in my mind, for his conquests are not all that intrigue me, but also how he viewed his fellow Romans and Roma itself.
What disgraceful deaths both Pompeius and Caesar found, yet, this served as a balance for their glories in life!



I hope others will answer in spite of what I wrote on the conduct of EB supporters and developers.

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Originally Posted by Glenn

Yes, this mod is grand, worthy of payment and brilliantly studied.
But the praise that it recieves will be invalid and dull if it is sought and demanded too readily by the developing team.

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And I dare say the EBs would agree, just a degree of thoughtful tack and respect for alot of hard work, who's fruits were freely given would not of being a miss after the intial release, would of being nice from all fans. It was afterall a big moment for their labours.

But I presume the EBs want to move on from all that now, so perphaps there is no need to discuss it further.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Glenn

Firstly I will say I have noticed a pattern here, where at the beginning of a release, complaints are made on several obvious bugs.
The reporters of these problems are well aware of the efforts of the developing team, yet they are disappointed by what they have encountered.
So, no doubt with a feeling of self-percieved, rude ignorance, which is justified depending on perspective, they report it here.

Now there are some who have done this in a truly insulting manner.
But there are others who have queried and gestured most politely, and appeared as helpfully as they could.
And many times these members were met with harsh returns by developers who, whether irritated for previous insults or not, replied with comments that were very selfish in themselves, and too expectant.

To me, it was a shameless way to attempt to heap guilt upon those who wanted only to perfect this mod as much as possible.
And perfection, or a position as near to is as can be achieved, is the objective of the Europa Barbarorum team.

Yes, this mod is grand, worthy of payment and brilliantly studied.
But the praise that it recieves will be invalid and dull if it is sought and demanded too readily by the developing team.


And you do all know that I am a supporter of this mod, and that I enjoy it as much as the most avid member, so I try to radiate it's entertainment to others especially through roleplay in that respective forum.
But to play the part of neutrality, in previous arguments on the respect or disrepect shown by complaining members - both sides were at times far too aggressive towards their own colleagues.

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Well, that was certainly deserved, wasn't it?

If I may, I would add the Geographica, by Strabo.

It's anecdotic, gossipy, blatantly unveridic but always funny (Taking of Thebes: the city with an hundred gates, whence twenty thousand chariots rush to war. Woah!). And since you're a fan of EB, you'll like it because it reads like a description of the different provinces in the game!

I tried back in college to read it in Koine but I had to drop my hoplon.


Good luck, the best is to come!

:book:

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Originally Posted by Glenn

Yes, this mod is grand, worthy of payment and brilliantly studied.

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Yeah! EB is without any doubt the best game I've ever played.

To answer a few of your gameplay questions:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Glenn

Has anyone ever experienced, with or without the addition of BI.exe, the Cassian faction launching a naval assault on the continent?

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I've never seen that (playing without BI) and I don't think it happens often even with BI. Sometimes players seem to encourage them by giving them a city in gaul, but without help they probably wont try it.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Glenn

How do you use spies effectively to create anti-government movements in other cities?
(My own spy can bring them to rebellion, but on one turn the public order stands at 20%, then immediately following it is 140% and I am thrown out within the next 3 turns)

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The AI seems to get help with public order, so the sucess of your spys depends a lot on luck. Sometimes one spy can cause a rebellion, sometimes 10 are not enough.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Glenn

In several faction progression reports I have seen the Chremonidean League in control of the Crimean peninsula, Syrakousai and Kyrene.
Does the faction itself aim for these places by naval warfare, or is it simply rebellion?

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This is mostly due to rebellion. Sometimes when the greeks are very strong they tend to head north and conquer Crimea but I doubt that they really aim for it, they just expand northwards then. In the case of Kyrene - they have an army there in 1.0, so they will conquer it more often now.

In general as you can see from other threads naval invasions without BI are kind of very rare.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Glenn

I am attempting to construct a Cassian Kingdom...

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Aren't you a bit late for that ? It's of course another thing if you're talking about the Catuvellauni, Casse for short... :beam:

I think I've only once seen Casse invade the mainland...but then again I'm always starting up new campaigns (I want to try them all..at once :dizzy2: )
so I almost never get past 220 b.c. This is with the BI-exe.

Also the KH do naval invasions, as do the Ptomelies, often there is bitter contest over Rhodos and Crete between these factions. The AS often grabs Cyprus from the Ptomelies.

As for spies, use more than one, I tend to swamp them but still it's hard to get rebellions.


As for old languages, I'll think I'll just stick to old norse

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Glenn

Thank you, Walker of the Land, for your suggestions.
Can you give me the title of this book?

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I can do one better: Latin: An Intensive Course.

Quote:

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Or better still refer to me Lessons that are written and available online? Even, if there are some in existence which is quite certain, could you provide me with Latin texts that I might combine with my current lessons to learn sentence structure more diversely?

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I don't know about lessons online, but Tufts has a Classics website with a huge amount of texts on it.

Quote:

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I notice also that the way you have translated the verses I wrote was not at all different in meaning, but more understandable in English.
Or does "Adessent" truly mean "At hand", because I was taught it meant appeared.
This is why I said, welfare people supreme as a law, because I was trying to show how I am told Latin is written, based on emotion and impression - which makes for very slow reading!
I hope I am right in this, another example I mean is by the line:

"Arma virvmqve cano, Troiae qvi primvs ab oris"
"Arms and men I sing, Troy who first from came", is how I was taught to understand it, but then you would in English translate,
"I sing of the arms and of the men, who first came from Troy".

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One of the things you should aim for in a faithful translation is, of course, making it intelligible. Latin's rules for word order are completely different from those of English, so it makes no sense (and, indeed, often makes nonsense) to rigidly preserve the order of the words in Latin when rendering them into English.

Adsum, adesse, adfui, adfuturus literally means "to be present" (hence "to be at hand"), but it can also mean "to approach" (and, hence, "to appear", but only in the sense of arriving, not in the sense of popping out of thin air).

As an aside, you left out "ab oris" in your translation of the first line of the Aeneid. "I sing of arms and a man (only one, virum), who first from the shores of Troy came." (I think that "venit", or some variation thereof, is in the second line--if not, it is at least implied in the first).

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I am greatly enthusiastic in the learning of this, and if successful then I will attempt Classical Greek.

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Greek is much harder than Latin is. Best of luck to you.

Quote:

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Finally on the subject of Latin, what incorrection did I make in interpreting "Qvisqve est barbarvs alio!" as Everyone is a barbarian sometimes?
What would 'alio' become in that sense?

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"Sometimes" is usually rendered in Latin as "non numquam" (literally "not never"), particularly by Cicero, or as "interdum". "Alio", in addition to meaning a garlic plant, also is a form of "alius, alia, aliud" (specifically, the ablative singular masculine/neuter), meaning "another" or "someone else", but this is not what it is doing in this quote, because the ablative case would make no sense. It so happens that "alio" is also an adverb, meaning "elsewhere; to another place/subject", hence "to someone" or, if you so desire, "Everyone is <considered> a barbarian somewhere." (where "considered" is implied--the gist is that, somewhere on the earth, there is a place where the people there will consider you barbarians. For Americans, that place is France. ~;))

Hope that cleared it all up a bit.

Cheers.

Alio is simply dat.sg. of alius? Therefore to s.o. else.

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Originally Posted by Tellos Athenaios

Alio is simply dat.sg. of alius? Therefore to s.o. else.

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That's what I thought at first, as well. However, in fact, the word has an utterly bizarre declension pattern:

NOM alius......alia.......aliud
GEN alterius...alterius...alterius
DAT alii.......alii.......alii
ACC alium......aliam......aliud
ABL alio.......alia.......alio
------------------------------------
NOM alii.......aliae......alia
GEN aliorum....aliarum....aliorum
DAT aliis......aliis......aliis
ACC alios......alias......alia
ABL aliis......aliis......aliis


Thus, "alio" can only be masculine/neuter ablative singular, if indeed it is from alius, alia, aliud. Obviously, in the context, that makes no sense, so it must be the adverbial form.

Either that, or somebody at EB made a grammatical boo-boo. :oops: Granted, one extremely easy to make, and which I almost made myself.

Cheers.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Glenn

Has anyone ever experienced, with or without the addition of BI.exe, the Cassian faction launching a naval assault on the continent?

How do you use spies effectively to create anti-government movements in other cities?
(My own spy can bring them to rebellion, but on one turn the public order stands at 20%, then immediately following it is 140% and I am thrown out within the next 3 turns)

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It's not quite a mainland invasion, but it still surprised me.
I was messing around this evening and had used move_character to relocate the lusos to ireland at the start. Within a couple of turns of me taking Ivernis two Casse FMs with a few mercenary units showed up and sieged the settlement. (I assume they weren't at war with eleuthoroi at that time though, else pirates probably would have stalled or sunk their invasion force). Wasn't expecting that to happen, kinda ruined the migration :laugh4:
BTW I am using BI.

As for spies, I tend to get my best spies in a group and launch a mass infiltration, but you have to pick your towns, some may be simply to loyal to rebel with your current agents (in that case train more spies i guess :|)
Also combine your spies with assasins to knock out public order buildings. Try to get it all done in one go to prevent your agents getting kicked out or the AI repairing stuff too quickly.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Landwalker

That's what I thought at first, as well. However, in fact, the word has an utterly bizarre declension pattern:

NOM alius......alia.......aliud
GEN alterius...alterius...alterius
DAT alii.......alii.......alii
ACC alium......aliam......aliud
ABL alio.......alia.......alio
------------------------------------
NOM alii.......aliae......alia
GEN aliorum....aliarum....aliorum
DAT aliis......aliis......aliis
ACC alios......alias......alia
ABL aliis......aliis......aliis


Thus, "alio" can only be masculine/neuter ablative singular, if indeed it is from alius, alia, aliud. Obviously, in the context, that makes no sense, so it must be the adverbial form.

Either that, or somebody at EB made a grammatical boo-boo. :oops: Granted, one extremely easy to make, and which I almost made myself.

Cheers.

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You know? That's precisely the kind of thing why it's so good I don't do the Latin translations for its Voicemod... It's been over 3 years since I actively translated Latin for homework. ~:)

Luckily my Greek hasn't rusted away as much: I keep it alive by feeding it EB so to speak. ~;)